Authors: Stephanie Judice
“Seems like you needed our help out
there, Dunaway.
You might want to try a
new strategy when the other team figures your game out,” Ben advised.
“Is there any way to shut virtual Ben
off?” I asked Gabe.
“I wish.”
Gabe took my bag and chunked it in the
very back with the rest of our gear.
I
unthinkingly hopped in the front seat.
“Oh, I see.
Girlfriend’s got the front seat now, huh?”
I felt my cheeks flush pink at hearing
Ben call me that, but I recovered quickly.
“It doesn’t seem to me that holograms
need preferential seating.
That’s for
the humans.”
“She got
ya
,”
said Zack, jumping into the back seat.
“Let’s stop at Mirabelle’s,” said
Gabe.
“I’m starving.
Is that okay, Zack?”
“Sure, man.
I’m in no hurry.”
“What about me?
You didn’t ask me? Am I invisible or
something?” whined Ben.
“Ben, I’ve known you since 1
st
grade, and you’ve never passed up an opportunity to eat.”
He shrugged in agreement and hopped in
next to Zack.
There were few customers at Mirabelle’s
Café on a Wednesday afternoon.
It was
crammed with customers during the week for lunch, being conveniently located near
the businesses on Main Street.
We
ordered a round of burgers and fries, which flew out of the kitchen
speedily.
There was a radio droning on
behind the counter somewhere.
“Hurricane Lucy may certainly be headed
to Louisiana.
The latest tracking update
has her eye travelling over New Orleans, which is bad news for New Orleans, but
good news for us here in
Acadiana
.
We still expect to have strong winds, but the
experts are saying there is little moisture in this vast storm to cause
flooding.
We’re not in the clear, but we
may have dodged a direct hit. . . .”
Gabe and I shared a knowing look.
I glanced at Ben whose unwavering golden aura
beamed brightly as he shoveled five fries in at a time.
He didn’t have a care in the world.
“Ben, how do you eat like that and stay
in shape?” I asked.
He grinned widely.
“Jealous, huh?” he said through a
mouthful, then gulped his Coke.
“He’s got the metabolism of a
racehorse,” said Zack.
“Yeah, and I can run like one,
too.
Hey, Clara, you’ve got to come to
our game next week, so you can catch a look at my super, awesome speed.”
“He is pretty fast,” agreed Gabe.
“Absolutely,” I assured him, dipping a
fry in ketchup.
“Hey, did you hear they might move the
football game up to Thursday night?” asked Zack.
“Some people are planning on evacuating if
that hurricane comes this way, and it will probably be pretty windy even if we
don’t get a direct hit.”
“Oh, yeah, we’ve got to go and see
Mark.
It’s his first game as starting
receiver, and he’d be pissed if we didn’t make it,” added Ben, shoveling his
last bite of burger into his mouth.
“You
wanna
go?” Gabe asked me.
“Sure.”
“Don’t tell me you wouldn’t go if she
didn’t go,” accused Ben.
“We’re not
already at that stage of the game, are we?”
“No comment,” said Gabe teasingly.
I grinned as Gabe took my hand and
pulled me out of the booth.
Ben harassed
us both for the duration of the ride to Zack’s house behind the sugar
mill.
He finally shut up when we pulled
up the drive where a somber man poked his head out of the hood of Zack’s
truck.
It was his father.
When I first saw him, I instantly
flinched, unintentionally squeezing Gabe’s hand.
A swirl of smoky black mist hovered over the
brawny man.
“See you guys,” said Zack, hastily
grabbing his bag and heading into the house.
His father followed in after him.
We could hear the shouting before we had
backed out of the driveway.
“Poor Zack,” said Ben.
“What’s wrong with his dad?” I asked
distractedly.
“He’s an alcoholic,” explained Gabe,
who seemed suddenly gloomy.
We rode the rest of the way in silence
to drop off Ben.
He waved over his head
as he loped up the driveway.
I was
looking down at my lap, thinking about Zack, when a long, slender piece of ash
settled on my knee.
“Ah!” I yelped, slapping it off of my
bare leg as if it were a poisonous insect ready to bite.
It left a black smudge mark that I
began rubbing frantically.
“It’s okay, it’s okay,” assured
Gabe.
“It’s just sugar cane,” he said,
pointing at other wispy black flakes floating through the air.
“What?” I asked, sounding a little
panicky.
“They burn the dried husks to make it
easier for harvesting.
They do it every
year at this time,” he explained, gesturing to the charred leafy ash floating
through the air.
“Oh,” I said apologetically, feeling
embarrassed at my overreaction.
I’d been living here for over a year,
but had only been through one sugar cane season.
“You’ve never noticed?”
“Um, I guess not.
Our house is nowhere near the sugar mill.”
I didn’t need to explain to Gabe that
my first thought was of the creatures from my dream when the flake of ash landed
on me.
Gabe lightly brushed the sooty
smudge on my knee, before shifting into third on the main road.
I felt a different kind of shiver that time.
There was another silent ride back to
my house.
The day waned into dusk as
hues of orange and pink settled in.
Shadows elongated and deepened to the east.
My thoughts lingered in the darkness.
Gabe pulled up my drive and walked
around to my side.
He braced both his
hands on either side of the door.
I gave
him a puzzled look, wondering what that determined expression on his face meant
and why he seemed to be blocking my exit.
“Okay.
So, tell me exactly why you reacted the way you did when you saw Zack’s
father.”
My heart lurched.
He must’ve noticed me flinch when I saw that
dark aura.
I just stared at him like an
idiot, watching his rainbow halo glowing, and trying to figure out a way to lie
to him.
“I just saw that he looked angry, and—”
“No.
That’s not true,” he accused.
“Please, Clara.
Tell me the
truth.”
His brown eyes were intense and steady,
holding me still.
His dark, wavy hair
fell forward.
I didn’t think I could lie
to him, but I was scared to death to tell him the truth. My pulse raced wildly,
knowing I was about to confess something no one else knew.
Also, because I was very aware of how close
he was standing to me.
“I know what people are feeling or
thinking, Gabe.”
“What?”
His tone didn’t sound skeptical, but it
had a scary edge of disbelief.
“Gabe, there’s something I need to tell
you about me.
It’s going to sound really
weird.”
“Go ahead,” he urged.
“I see energy auras around people,
which generally correlate to what kind of mood they’re in or what kind of
person they are.
And, Zack’s dad’s aura
was very dark.
I knew that something was
wrong.”
Gabe was shaking his head, but at the
same time smiling broadly.
“What?
You don’t believe me, do you?
I
knew you wouldn’t.
Why did I even
bother?”
I was ticked off.
Why did I tell him?
I’m such an idiot.
“Yes.
Without a doubt, Clara, I do believe you.”
Huh?
“How can you?” I asked aloud, trying to
understand the bizarre smile on his face.
“Because, Clara, there is something
really weird I need to tell you about me.”
“What is it?”
He sort of chuckled first.
“I can feel what other people are
feeling, Clara.
I’ve been able to do it
since I was very young.”
No. Way.
I was speechless for several seconds.
“Really?” I finally asked, feeling a
smile come to my lips.
“Yes, really.
At the very same moment that you squeezed my
hand in Zack’s driveway, I felt a wave of anger come over me from his dad.
I knew that somehow you felt what I
felt.
I didn’t realize that you actually
saw his feelings.”
Gabe exhaled deeply, as if a monumental
boulder had cracked and fallen away from his shoulders.
I finally hopped out of the Jeep, leaning
against the side.
“So, you know when people are happy or
angry.
You just feel it?”
“Yes.”
“You know what I’m feeling when I’m
around you?” I asked. Very nervously, I might add.
“Yes,” he said.
That tilted smile came to his lips, and
that crazy butterfly in my stomach was flapping like its wings just caught on
fire.
I blushed even though I tried to
act casual.
“What do auras look like?” he asked.
“Well, they’re like transparent colors
of all shades.
They sometimes hover only
over the head.
Sometimes, they flow down
further over a person.
I’m not sure
why.”
“What color is my aura?” he asked.
I grinned.
This was something I’d been wanting to tell
him since I met him.
“That’s the funny thing about you,
Gabe.
You don’t have one color.
You have every color.
Maybe it’s because you have so many feelings
of others bouncing off of you.
Yeah, now
that I think about it, that explains it,” I said.
“Well, I think I finally know why you
numb my other sense,” he said, edging toward me.
“Numb you?” I asked, feeling my heart
pick up speed erratically.
“Yeah, when we first met, the reason I
didn’t seem to like you is because I couldn’t figure out why my other sense got
all fuzzy around you.
It must have
something to do with your ability to see these auras, the energy or something.
It messes with my ability somehow.”
“That’s crazy,” I whispered, realizing
he was leaning ever closer to me.
I’ve had little experience with
kissing.
Sadly, very little.
There was Shane Bradford in eighth grade
behind the gym.
Yes, a cliché, I know,
but it really was my first experience.
All I remember is that Shane was a sloppy kisser.
He was all over the place with his mouth to
the point that I started giggling and quickly ended our blooming middle school
romance.
There was David Weber at my
freshman homecoming dance in New Orleans.
David was sweet.
Our first and
last kiss, while we swayed to Jewel’s 90’s hit “Pieces of You” on the dance
floor, was nice.
Just nice.
Then, there was Jordan Blanchard, a friend of
Trey Hawkes on the BCHS football team who took me to a party in the back of a
cane field my first year here.
I’d just
moved here and didn’t know any better at the time.
I don’t remember his kissing abilities,
because I spent too much time fending off his roaming hands.
Now, Gabe, whose hands were perfectly
still on my hips, were sending me an insanely intense vibe.
He moved slowly, tenderly.
A shot of heat flowed through me as his lips
gently met mine.
My heart beat
frantically when he pulled me to him, continuing his slow, soft kiss. After
what felt like the longest, most pleasant minute of my life, he pulled away and
looked down at me.
I realized to my
embarrassment that I was a little breathless.
His dark eyes never moved from mine.
Piercing, motionless, they held me still.
He was so close, I could feel his heart
beating against me.