Arcadia's Gift (Arcadia Trilogy) (19 page)

I jabbed the off button hard. Let him text until his thumbs bleed. Didn’t mean I had to read it.

Jinx returned with two Diet Pepsis, set the drinks on top of a stack of mail strewn across the top of the coffee table and dragged a chair up so that she sat across from me, our knees a foot apart.

“Okay…so learning how to block signals takes practice. You might get a bit of a headache at first, but like any other muscle, once you get used to using your mind in this way, it’ll get stronger and it won’t bother you anymore.”

I nodded.

“Now, tell me what you are sensing from me right now.”

I studied the woman in front of me, sitting cross legged. I wasn’t getting much of anything off of her. Dressed in a pair of ancient Levi’s and an apple green t-shirt, her springy hair tangled up into a bun held in place by a couple of wooden pencils, Jinx appeared to be totally at ease.

“I don’t feel much from you. Just a general feeling of contentment,” I said.

She grinned, “Good! I’ve been feeling very even-keel today —not too happy, but not upset or anything either. Now, I’m going to think about something that will change my mood. Let me know what you feel.”

She lowered her gaze to her lap, but her face remained perfectly neutral. I wondered again how old she was. Her oval-shaped face was un-lined, but her eyes held wisdom in their depths, giving her an ageless feel.

After a moment, the atmosphere in the room changed. Low levels of vibration tickled my mind. I tasted them with my sixth sense.

“There’s something…not quite sadness…more like nostalgia. Longing?”

Jinx giggled and the vibrations changed to a warm happiness. “That’s so cool! I was thinking about my mother. She died when I was so young that it’s hard to feel sad about it. I just sort of miss her, you know? I always wondered what it would be like if she had lived. Let’s try another one!”

She steadied her face again and concentrated. This time the buzzing grew with tension. My pulse increased a little.

“Anger?” I asked. “Frustration?”

“Yep,” she said, letting the emotion fade. “My cell phone company completely screwed up my bill this month and I spent half of the morning yesterday on the phone with —” she raised her fingers in air quotes “ —customer service, which was really just a call center in Bangalore or someplace.”

I was pretty pleased with myself. Maybe this empathy thing wouldn’t be so bad when I got used to it. I picked up my soda and took a long swig, letting the effervescence tingle the inside of my mouth before swallowing.

“Alright,” Jinx continued, “I’m going to summon that same feeling again, only I want you to try to block me.”

“How?” I asked.

She pursed her lips together and squinted. “I don’t know. That is, I don’t know how to describe it. It’s second nature to me now. Okay…use your mind to feel the signal that I’m broadcasting.” She must have turned her thoughts back on Bangalore because the frustration meter ramped up again. “Can you feel it?”

“Yes,” I replied. My eyes drifted closed. Slowly, I reached the tendrils of my mind out to touch the emotions between us. I felt around them, stroking the edges, letting them lap at me like waves rolling and retreating on the wet sand of a beach.

“Now,” she whispered, trying not to break my concentration. “Block me.”

I flexed my mind, squeezing my fists tightly. The sand on my inner beach began to rise, holding the waves back. I could still feel the vibrations out there, but they couldn’t quite reach me. The muscles in my abdomen and shoulders flexed to lend my mind additional strength, but after about thirty seconds, I lost my grip and Jinx’s frustration came pouring through.

“Stop!” I shouted a little louder than I’d meant to.

Jinx let her thoughts fade back to neutral. “That’s good…really good! You actually had me blocked there for a while. How do you feel?”

The “little headache” that she’d warned me about was actually an ice pick being pounded into my frontal lobe. I rubbed my temples in slow circles.

“Ah, your head hurts. Told you that would happen. Want me to get you an Ibuprophen?”

I shook my head. “No, I’ll be okay. Let’s do it again.”

As I pulled into the parking lot outside the shelter, my brain trembled with a full blown migraine. I accepted some pain reliever from Jinx before leaving her house, and she assured me that the ache would go away soon, but I wished I could go home and crawl into bed. I was ready for this day to end.

Bronwyn’s car was parked in the lot, too. The mortification I felt at lunch seeped back.
God, how could I have let Bryan lead me on like that?
I chastised myself silently for not asking him about his girlfriend status when we first started talking.

Maybe, I’d get lucky and Bronwyn wouldn’t bring it up.

“Hi, Cady,” Gina said as I walked in the front door. She had her school books splayed out in front of her on the front desk. She worked at the shelter as a vet tech while in veterinary school.

“I can watch the desk for you,” I offered, knowing that it was Gina’s least favorite job.

“Nah,” she replied, biting on the end of her pen. “It’s been really slow today, so I don’t have much else to do. Dr. Kristy is doing paperwork and Bronwyn was waiting for you to come so you guys can walk the dogs together.”

I nodded. “Okay.”

I stopped by the break room to stash my backpack before heading out to the kennels. At the sound of the door hinges, the dogs went nuts, barking and wagging their tails to get attention. Bronwyn was refilling water dishes that had been drained or tipped over during the day.

“Hey,” I said.

“Oh, hi,” she replied, the compassionate look on her face echoed the soft waves of worry coming from her. “How are you? I tried calling.”

“Oh, yeah. My phone’s off.”

Her brows crinkled together in reproof. “So you haven’t talked to Bryan then?”

I sighed. “No, and I’m not going to either.”

“Cady —”

“Save it, Bron,” I snapped a little louder than I’d intended. I felt a twinge of hurt flash off Bronwyn, but it was gone just as quickly. “I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

She sighed and rolled her eyes to the heavens. “Okay, fine. But I want the record to reflect that I think you should hear him out.”

“Noted.”

I walked over to the leash cabinet and began untangling a few that had fallen to the bottom. By the time Bronwyn finished with the water bowls, I had six dogs leashed up and ready to go.

“So,” she said, as the dogs tugged us along in their excitement. “You haven’t told me how school is going for you since you’ve been back.”

What could I say? While not as fanatic as her parents, Bronwyn’s faith in religion was pretty strong. She wouldn’t even read the horoscopes in the newspaper because she believed they were demonic. How would she react to the revelation that I could feel her emotions vibrating off of her whenever she stepped within my aura field? Would she think I’m possessed or something?

I just shrugged. “It’s okay, I guess. No, actually, it sucks, but I can feel it getting better.”

“Understandable,” she replied. A lab mix that I didn’t know spotted a squirrel and yanked hard on her arm. “Patch! Stop it!”

The errant dog ducked his head and fell back in step beside her. With the subject of Bryan off limits, we settled into an easy conversation about school gossip. After suffering through the wild emotional mood swings brought on by other people, it was nice walking through the woods with my best friend. I’d always thought of her as an even-keel, peaceful person, but now I had firsthand knowledge to back it up. Her cheerfulness brushed along my skin with soft, steady touches. Only when the dogs did something naughty did they stir, like a pebble in a pool of water. I almost felt normal again.

After making our circuit three times with different sets of dogs, we brought the animals inside for the night, tucking them into their indoor kennels. To my pleasure, Bronwyn didn’t mention Bryan again. That was one thing I really loved about her. She never pushed me to talk about things I wanted to avoid.

The peaceful feeling brought on my best friend was lost the moment I pulled into my driveway. This time, I had no one else to blame for my nervous heart palpitations. Bryan sat on my front steps, the porch light shining down on him as he sat playing some game on his phone. He put it away and stood as I approached.

“Hi, Cady,” he said. He genuinely felt miserable. I could feel it pooling in my gut.
Good.

“Bryan,” I replied with a tightness to my voice. I was in no mood to go easy on him, no matter how badly he felt.

He jammed his hands in his pants pockets. “I’ve been texting you all day.”

“I know.”

“You didn’t reply.”

“I didn’t read them.”

He shook his head and gazed at the ground between our feet. His frustration was making my arms break out in goose bumps.

“Cady, will you just give me a chance to explain?”

I placed my fists on my hips. “Fine. You have exactly one minute, then I’m going in to bed. I’ve had a long day.”

He sighed. “Look, Monica and I dated for a few months before I moved here. It wasn’t even all that serious, but we’d been friends before that and when I left, we decided to go back to being just friends.”

“But she’s flying halfway across the country to go to a stupid dance with you? Yeah, that sounds like just a casual thing a
friend
might do.”

Bryan’s posture slumped and sparks of annoyance shot out from him. “Before school started, I was miserable here. Didn’t know anyone or have anywhere to hang out. I was so bored!” He ran his hand through his hair and blew out a heavy breath from his mouth. “I spent pretty much all of my time on Skype talking to my old friends. Monica had this idea that it might cheer me up to have a date for my first Homecoming here. Her family has money, so it wasn’t that big of a deal for her to score airfare to come out for a weekend. I only agreed because I was lonely.”

Recalling how lonesome Bryan had appeared that first afternoon in the library, my indignation started to falter.

He must have sensed it, because he stepped forward to take up my hands in his and continued. “She booked the tickets months ago, before I even met you. I’m not even all that into dances and things, but if I have to go, I’d rather it be with you.”

The sincerity in his voice was intensified by the warmth in my belly. I hated to admit it, but I could see his point. How could he let this girl come all of the way out to Iowa to see him and not take her to the dance?

“I don’t know why you’re explaining to me anyway,” I said in a huff, “It’s not like I have some claim over you.”

“You don’t?” he asked with a playful grin. “I’d say you have plenty of claim over me.” He wrapped his arms around my waist and drew me to his chest.

The proximity of his scent and the warmth of his sentiment won me over. Being in direct contact with his skin made it impossible for me to resist. I lifted my arms up around his shoulders and rested my head on his chest, his heart thumping in time to the waves of affection that he was unknowingly sending through my body. We stood there holding each other and swaying slightly with the breeze for a long moment.

“So,” he whispered into my hair, “I think I have a solution for my little dance predicament.”

“Hmm?” I replied with my eyes closed so I could concentrate on the beat of his heart.

“Well, I have a plan, but I’ll have to fill you in on it later. I need to get home now. My mother wants me there for dinner tonight. Joy. Joy.” He rolled his eyes.

“Okay. I’ll talk to you later,” I said, rising on my tip-toes for a kiss before he left.

Once inside the house, I shucked my shoes and went to the kitchen to fix something to eat. I was squeezing the unnaturally-orange-but-incredibly-tasty cheese into the pot of boiled macaroni when Aaron came bounding up the basement steps.

“Hey,” he grunted, dipping his finger through the river of fake cheese and licking it off.

“Ew! You better have clean hands.” I shoved him away.

He laughed. “Just took a shower.”

His hair was damp.

“Do you want any?” I offered.

“Nah,” he said, tying his shoes. “Going over to Trent’s house for a Call of Duty marathon.”

“Maybe you should try a homework marathon one of these nights.”

“You’re so funny!” he mocked before running out the door.

I was pouring mac and cheese into a bowl when from upstairs I heard the clatter of shattering glass and the boom of something heavy falling on the floor.
Mom!
Abandoning my bowl, I ran up the steps two at a time and burst into my mom’s bedroom without knocking.

“Mom?” I called out. The flickering light coming from the TV was the only light in the room, but I could see her bed was empty, the covers pulled back and resting half on the floor.

A moan sounded from the direction of the closed bathroom door.

I knocked, my other hand poised on the knob, ready to fling it open. Tendrils of fear, self-loathing and pain snaked through from inside, threatening to cut off my breathing, but around the edges of the emotions I detected the fuzziness of intoxication.