Grayscale

by A. E. Clarke

  Chapter Thirteen: Holly

  I held open the door to Fran’s for Alex and followed him in, snaking my arm around his. He didn’t know why I was so energetic—when he asked if I’d plugged myself in last night to be this full of energy, I couldn’t stop laughing for long enough to tell him why—but he was having fun with how hyper and happy I was.

  I think that he’d just pegged it as either painkillers—that I’d sworn up and down I hadn’t been prescribed or taking—or just giddiness due to having survived.

  I smiled at the waitress as she came to give us menus. She was one of the regular waitresses who vaguely knew Alex and me—though she’d gotten it into her head that my name was Molly and I couldn’t change her mind—and she knew the general areas that we liked to sit in.

  “Coffee for the both of you, right? One cream, one with milk?”

  Alex and I both nodded. The benefit of coming here way too often. I shook my head and chuckled a little bit.

  “What’re you going to have today, babe?” he asked.

  I scowled at the menu. “I think I’m gonna stick to soup and a bur…” I trailed off, raising an eyebrow. I thought I could see Jesse around the corner, sitting with his back to us.

  And the guy across the table? Well, that’s…well…a guy.

  “A burr?”

  “Is that Jesse?” I pointed because I wasn’t actually one hundred percent sure, but it definitely looked like it was him.

  “Jesse? I thought he said he had a study date tonight, not a dinner date.”

  “Yeah, but look.” I motioned with my head. Alex rolled his eyes and turned around to look, but not before I noticed his expression.

  “You already knew about them, didn’t you?” I accused.

  He turned around, eyes wide. “You know?”

  “Well, now I do.”

  He swore and massaged his temple. “I can’t believe that was how you figured it out.”

  “I would’ve liked someone to tell me, but I was already wondering.”

  “Oh. Okay, then I feel a bit better.” He paused as my tone sank in, then sighed. “And it’s not that I thought you were going to look down on him for it or anything. I walked in on the two of them not long after they started going out, and we all kind of freaked out, and Jesse made me promise not to tell you until he’d gotten a chance to talk to you about it, and—”

  “Slow down, hon, you’re going to choke on yourself.” I tried not to laugh, but when he actually did start coughing, I couldn’t help it.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Jesse freeze and turn around, also in the middle of laughing. When he saw me, his eyes widened, and he jerked backwards, startled. A moment later, he gave me a calm smile and waved nonchalantly. I waved back.

  Both of us were trying to figure out how we were going to handle the situation. Without breaking the staring contest the wave had turned into, I started to stand, catching the attention of the waitress. I pointed to the table that Jesse was sitting at, then at our table.

  “We’re not—” Alex began.

  “Why not?” I smiled at the waitress, who nodded and took us over to Jesse’s table. “I gotta hand it to you, Jesse.”

  “Hey, Holly—what’s that?” He was breathing a bit too quickly to appear as calm and collected as he was trying to.

  “Once you saw me, you acted like nothing was amiss pretty much immediately.” I sat next to him, and Alex meekly sat next to his boyfriend. Or at least, who I had to assume was his boyfriend.

  I looked him over, since most of what I’d noticed last night consisted of he’s shirtless, he’s going into my little brother’s room, and he’s a he. Now I could get a better look at him, the best impression I had was that he looked like he was trying to be a macho jock without any idea of how to pull that off. He was wearing a baggy hoodie and had what looked like a stud in his ear, half-hidden by his shaggy black hair.

  A bead of sweat formed on his brow—I think he’d figured out that I knew what their, uh, relationship was—and I stuck out a hand.

  How best to put this?

  “So, I hear you’re banging my brother?”

  Jesse, to his credit, almost managed not to spit out the mouthful of water he’d drunk to cover the awkwardness.

  Almost.

  I withdrew my hand to clap my brother on the back, still looking at his boyfriend, and then, when Jesse had stopped sounding like I needed to worry about his health, I stuck out my hand again.

  “I think I recognize you, but we’ve never been formally introduced. Y’know, while wearing shirts?” That set Jesse off again, and I did my best to ignore both him and Alex, who seemed torn between horror and laughter.

  “Wait—you saw him?”

  “More than I wanted to, even,” I said, laughing. Jesse could only respond by flipping me off, while his boyfriend tried to stay serious, though I could see the glint of laughter in his eyes. I think I like him. At least, at this point. Not that I’m overprotective or anything. “Holly Gray,” I said.

  “Brent Wang, but just call me Brent.”

  I nodded, and turned to Jesse, grinning from ear to ear. “Sorry, bro, couldn’t help it.”

  “I’m going to kill you,” he muttered, trying to wipe up the water he’d spit onto the table. They didn’t seem to have gotten their food yet, either, which was good. I’d feel bad making them wait for replacement food because I made Jesse spit all over it. “I’m going to kill you in your sleep tonight, and no jury would ever convict me.”

  Brent started laughing nervously, and it was contagious. By the time all three of us were laughing, Jesse really didn’t have any choice but to join in. The waitress came back and seemed a little disappointed that she’d missed the joke—I told her it was one of those things where you had to be there. She took our food order and left again, and I saw Jesse reach for Brent’s hand. It made me smile. Even if he had been too scared to tell me about someone who obviously meant a lot to him, I was glad he was comfortable enough to show me now that I knew.

  “So, should we leave you two alone after all, or—”

  “No, it’s okay.”

  I raised my eyebrows. I’d been expecting Jesse to make a snap judgement—it was what he did best—but it was Brent who had spoken. He blushed as soon as he said it.

  Huh. Interesting.

  “Holly, for the record, I—”

  “Can it, pipsqueak.” I reached my arm around Jesse’s shoulder and pulled him into my side for a moment before letting go. “I’m a little hurt that you were worried about telling me, but I’m happy for you. Just, y’know, hang a sock on the door. And, uh, wear a shirt around the house, maybe?” I looked at Brent pointedly, trying hard not to laugh again, and he went a lot redder than I was expecting.

  “Would you mind answering me something?” he asked.

  I shrugged.

  “You saw the traffic snarl at Yonge and College, I assume?”

  Alex answered before I could open my mouth. “I was about to point it out to her when the lights came back on. Weird timing, eh?”

  I looked over at Jesse and could tell we were both thinking along the same lines.

  Sure.

  Weird.

  Chapter Fourteen: Jesse

  We ended up all leaving together, since Holly and I were both bringing our significant others back home. I think Brent’s heart rate had even finally started to slow to something approaching normal by the time we left the restaurant.

  On the bus home, Brent squeezed my hand, and I squeezed it back. I was starting to worry about him: that was the twelfth or thirteenth time we’d passed that exchange back and forth. Even though he and Holly had been getting along fine and I couldn’t detect any tension between them, it felt like he needed it. His leg had been bouncing underneath the table the entire meal, which was a sure sign he was trying too hard to stay calm.

  As I moved to get off the bus at our regular stop, Brent held me back.

  “Hm?”

  “I want some alo
ne time with my boyfriend. Sue me.” The bus took off again— Holly and Alex didn’t seem to notice we weren’t behind them as they got off—and Brent leaned over and gave me a kiss on the cheek. I blushed almost as red as he usually did. It was the first time we’d shown any real affection in our neighbourhood—it was only then it hit me that we’d boldly gotten on the bus still holding hands and had mirrored Holly and Alex, half-cuddling on the cramped seats. Maybe that was why he’d been squeezing my hand so often.

  I rang the bell for the next stop and leaned my head on his shoulder until the bus slowed down.

  It was dark out, way too early—it still felt weird for it to be dark at eight o’clock, let alone five in the afternoon like it was today. Winter be damned.

  We walked the first half-block in silence, and then he sighed. Yeah, I was pretty sure this was about something other than wanting to spend more time alone together than what we’d be getting once we hit my room and could block out Holly and Alex.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Mmm.”

  I looked up at him. He was staring steadfastly ahead, jaw set. I sensed the tension rolling off him in waves.

  “What’s wrong?”

  He stopped walking and tugged on my arm, trying to swing me around to look at him. I reflexively resisted, then consciously let myself be turned around. “I want to know,” he said.

  “You want to know?”

  “Yes.”

  “What d’you want to know?”

  “I want to know what you were saying about Holly earlier today.”

  “Oh, about—about the streetlight thing?” I winced.

  “Yeah.”

  “I…I told you, I can’t. She’d kill me.”

  “I thought that was just Holly being…well, Holly.”

  I smacked him on the chest—harder than I’d meant to, judging by his wince.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean for that to hurt, but that was uncalled for.”

  “I know, and I know, I’m sorry. But you’re not getting out of this one.”

  I reached down and rubbed his side. “Please trust me?”

  “I trust you. Now trust me.”

  Well, that backfired a little bit. “I can promise you that you’re not going to believe me, babe.”

  “Jesse. Love. Tell me. You never really know until you try, right?”

  I sighed and leaned against his chest. “Promise you won’t laugh?”

  “You’ve had the past couple days come straight from the fifth level of hell, love. I’m not going to make it worse if I can help it.”

  “Holly…I dunno. Since she woke up, she can do…things.”

  He raised his eyebrow, and I could tell he was trying not to laugh. “She ‘came back different’? Really? That’s the approach you’re taking?”

  “I’m not kidding.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She…” I sighed and leaned into his chest again, shaking my head. “I don’t even know how to say it. I wouldn’t believe me if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes.”

  “I see.”

  “She… Okay, you read comics as a kid, right?”

  “Now this is a weird approach.”

  “I’m trying to tell you!”

  He sighed and stepped backwards. I caught myself before I fell over. “Let’s walk and talk, then, okay?”

  I nodded, chewing on my lip. He leaned over and kissed me, then pulled back and said, “Lips are friends, not food.”

  “Seriously? You just referenced a Disney movie during a serious conversation?”

  “Says the guy who was trying to bring comic books into it.”

  “Into a conversation about superpow—” I stopped, both vocally and physically. Well, then. I suppose that was one way to bring it up.

  Way to go, Jesse. Way to fucking go.

  “She’s…what, she’s got superhuman abilities? She’s X-Man?”

  “There isn’t actually anyone named X-Man, Brent. Your childhood was incredibly stunted.”

  “Jesse.”

  “Okay, fine! I’ll stop stalling. I promise. I’m going to—” He yanked on my arm, and I fell into his side. “Ow!”

  “Tell me.”

  “I’m just going to say it. She has superpowers. Or may as well. She can make electricity pretty much come out of her pores, and I almost walked in on her shooting a lightning bolt at the other end of the porch earlier today.”

  Brent stopped completely. “Jesse, c’mon! What the hell is so important that you don’t want to tell me?”

  “I’m not lying.”

  “So it was a weird trick of the light, then.”

  “We were outside, and it was the middle of the day, hon. I know what I saw.”

  “No, I don’t think you do—if that’s what you’re telling me.”

  I took a step back, offended. “I’m sorry, what are you saying? That I’m either a liar or stupid? ’Cause that’s what I’m hearing.”

  “I’m saying that I don’t know what you’re not telling me—”

  “There’s nothing I’m not telling you!”

  “I thought you trusted me more than this!”

  “I do trust you! I wouldn’t have told you anything at all if I didn’t trust you.” I realized my voice had gotten quieter as I went on and ended up grabbing onto his shoulder and pulling him back so I could look him in the eyes, will him to believe me. I was trying hard not to get angry at him because hey, I couldn’t be sure I would believe him if the situation were reversed.

  “Honestly, Brent. I’m not lying to you. I’m not keeping anything from you. It’s an incredibly…weird situation, to say the least, but I’m being honest here, and you’re not hearing me.”

  He shook his head and took a step back. “No, you’re not telling me anything that makes sense. If you’re gonna be like this, I’m gonna have to go home tonight.”

  We reached the street corner where we would go in different directions if we were going to our own houses, and I bit my lip, wishing we’d walked a block further.

  He reached out and brushed at my mouth, making me stop. “I need some time alone to…I don’t even know. Figure out what you could be keeping from me that I wouldn’t need to worry about.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know how I can prove it to you without you seeing Holly do it, and I don’t think she’ll let you come over for Show and Tell.”

  “Take a video.”

  “What?”

  “Hide a webcam or something. Or—”

  “Yes! I’m helping her train to control it better. I can definitely make up some reason why I’d need to film her!”

  He shook his head. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m wondering what she did to get you to believe that was what you saw.”

  “Listen, I grabbed her hand and my hair stood on end. There was a lot of electricity in the air, and—”

  “Jesse…I’m going home, okay? I’ll talk to you tomorrow, I guess.”

  “Wait—”

  “Should I call you, or will you call me?”

  “I don’t want you to leave angry.”

  “I don’t want to leave angry, either. But I’d rather leave angry than stay angry.”

  “Yell at me, then.”

  “I don’t see what good that will do.”

  “Get angry at me so we can work our way through this and go back to how things were.”

  “I don’t know if that can happen until I know what’s going on.”

  “I keep telling you—I’m not lying! And it couldn’t have been a trick of the light, but—”

  “I know, but you can’t be sure.”

  “And you can’t wait for the video before you call me a liar.”

  He backed off, and I grabbed his hand, bringing it up between our chests and holding it in both of mine as I looked him in the eye. We were both ready to cry, though part of it was the wind whipping around in the cool evening air.

  “Please, Brent
. I’m asking you to let it go for another day, maybe two. Come home with me, and let’s put this behind us for twenty-four hours.”

  “You’re not putting anything behind you, though.”

  “The hell I’m not,” I said, squeezing his hand and then letting it drop as I turned—hopefully, I’ll admit—towards my house and away from his. “I’m letting go that you don’t trust me. At least…” I turned to look at him, trying to smirk the way I normally would. I winked. “At least this time.”

  He laughed, and it was as if a spell had been broken. We walked the rest of the way home without even mentioning it.

  Now I had to find a way to convince Holly to let me film her. We had the video camera; that wasn’t the problem. I needed something to happen or to figure out what I could say to get her worried about her control over her powers.

  Chapter Fifteen: Holly

  I flashed the bus driver my bus pass as I hopped on at the plaza on the corner the next morning, sipping my coffee to wake me up. I still felt a little woozy, but I couldn’t afford to be asleep any longer. Within half an hour, I’d be handling metal that would be red-hot coming out of the oven.

  “Good morning.”

  I looked up, surprised, and nodded at the bus driver, giving him a wide berth. It was a little weird for them to say anything—it always made me wary, not wanting to get trapped into making small talk—and I took a seat a bit farther back than I normally did. The bus was pretty busy for four-thirty on a Sunday morning. Usually, there’d be a couple passengers headed to work the same as I was, and from time to time, I’d see a couple drunk people en route home from some late-night bar-hopping, but it was rare for there to be a half dozen people other than the driver.

  I sat in one of the single seats to the side of the bus, facing the front, and turned up my music.

  Oh, the sights, sounds, and smells of the Toronto transit system in the middle of the night. There was a good reason the overnight bus was known as the Vomit Comet. Puke, urine, and a lot of alcohol—I could see where all those wonderful aromas were coming from: the bum passed out across three seats and the college student who had, very obviously, puked down the front of his dress shirt.