Being Jamie Baker (11 page)

“When I lose control, some kind of power surge explodes from me, and anything electrical in my vicinity gets cooked. That’s when it gets scary.”

Ryan leaned back a little, disappointed, when it was clear that the moment was gone. “Makes sense,” he said. “But why are you so afraid of hurting me? It’s not like I run on batteries.”

“You’re kidding, right?” Ryan just gave me a blank look. “Yeah, I can’t zap you from across the room like the lights, but that doesn’t mean I can’t hurt you if you touch me when I’m all charged up.

Didn’t you pay any attention in science class?”

“I may have fallen asleep once or twice.” Ryan pouted as if my comment had offended him, but I knew better, and he grinned right on cue. “Hey, I can’t be good-looking
and
a genius. Wouldn’t want all the girls in school to fight over me or anything.”

“Oh please! They all do that already, and you know you love it.”

“Okay, fine, maybe I do.” Ryan chuckled. But then his face became completely serious. “But it’s really frustrating that the one girl in school who doesn’t need to fight for me won’t even get in the ring.” Okay, he did
not
just make me blush with a lame sports metaphor. What is wrong with me?

Sweet-talking jerk.

“Ryan.” I sighed. “You only say that because I’m the first girl who’s ever said no.”

“I know you think that.” Ryan shook his head forcefully. “But it’s just not true.”

“You mean you’ve actually been rejected before?” I didn’t hold back any of my doubt.

“Well, no,” Ryan admitted, that cocky grin creeping into the corners of his mouth. “But you know that’s not what I meant.”

“Either way it’s never going to happen, so you need to stop trying. Please!”

“But why? I already know about you now, so what’s stopping you?”

“Did you ever consider the possibility that I’m not interested? That maybe I just don’t like you that way?”

Ryan looked at me like I’d just said the impossible. “What’s not to like?” I gave him a less than enthusiastic look, but he never once considered backing down. “How about I make you a deal,” he said, and I had to admit, this had me curious. “I’ll take you out this weekend on a proper date, anywhere you want. But you have to go with an open mind and give me an honest shot. If I can’t make you fall madly in love with me by the end of the night, I’ll never ask you out again.” And there he went again, breaking me down. Like he would need till the end of the night? He didn’t even need till the end of this conversation. I could feel my head starting to bob up and down, accepting the offer without my approval. “No!” I shouted, trying to stay strong. “We are never going to go out on a date. We can’t! Remember that part about me being dangerous?”

“So you fry small electronics, big deal. I just won’t stand next to anything that can explode.”

“You still conduct electricity!” I didn’t mean to yell, but I was just so desperate to make him see how serious I was. “All it would take is one touch. If you reach out to me when I’m really upset, or take me by surprise and startle me, I could roast you. Trust me, accidents happen, and if one ever did, I wouldn’t even be able to stop myself. I’d freak out, and it would only kill you quicker. I’m sorry, Ryan, but I just can’t risk it.”

That seemed to do the trick. Ryan released a huge frustrated sigh. “Well, if we can’t ever be friends or anything else, then what are you doing here? Why did you come with me? Why are you telling me all this?”

“I didn’t want to, but I didn’t have a choice.” The confusion in his eyes made me want to cry. I lowered my voice so that he wouldn’t notice how unsteady it was. “You knew I was in that accident. I was afraid that if I didn’t come, you’d get mad and tell everyone about me.”

“Well, that’s one thing you don’t have to worry about. I’m not going to tell anyone. I promise.” I was surprised by how hurt he looked. Again! It seems like every time I talk to him I hurt his feelings in one way or another. I felt really bad about that, but I also felt just as deflated as he did at the moment. I barely managed an audible “Thanks.”

He nodded, I shrugged, and then we just sat there.

I looked at the garden around me again, and it really is true what they say about finding tranquility in beautiful places. The garden was so beautiful, and I had so much on my mind, that it was hard not to just let my thoughts run away with me. I don’t know how long Ryan let me sit there and think, but it felt like it had been an eternity when he finally spoke.

“Jamie?” I pulled my eyes up to meet his. “How exactly were you in that accident? It doesn’t make any sense. Electricity can’t put you in two places at once. And how come you didn’t get hurt? Mike said that marquee landed on you.”

I knew this was coming. In fact, I was surprised it took him so long to ask. But even though Ryan already knew I was different, and miraculously seemed to be okay with it, I was still scared of having to tell him
everything
.

“
Hurt
is a relative term.”

I felt the butterflies return to my stomach, so I took a deep breath before I shyly pulled my shirtsleeve as far off my shoulder as it would go, giving Ryan more than enough of a view of the bruises that covered it. “I should probably be dead right now, so I guess in a sense I didn’t get hurt, but I jammed my shoulder pretty good, and my head still feels like it’s being smashed against pavement repeatedly.”

Ryan’s mouth was gaping open at this point. He couldn’t seem to tear his eyes from my black-and-blue shoulder, so I kept talking in order to avoid any more awkward silence. “Whatever this power inside me is, it makes me different. I wasn’t in two places at once. I just got from one to the other very fast.”

“You ran?”

I nodded, and he got quiet again. Then, though he was already stunned, something else occurred to him, something that had nothing to do with how fast I could move. “You ran underneath a giant falling sign?” he gasped.

I nodded again.

“Why?”

This time I shrugged. I honestly didn’t know why I did it. At the time I didn’t even think, I just reacted. “The guy on the lawn mower was about to be toast. I guess I couldn’t watch him die. I would have been standing safely back at your side by the time the thing hit the ground if that guy hadn’t weighed more than Shamu.”

“So you’re like Superman?”

I smiled, but I don’t think Ryan was trying to be funny. I think he was still trying to grasp the concept. I can’t blame him. It is a lot to absorb, and I gotta tell ya, he handled it a lot better than I did.

When I figured it out, I had a total breakdown that lasted for weeks. I’m glad Ryan is a lot more easygoing than me.

“I’m pretty sure Superman doesn’t bruise,” I joked, wanting to keep the situation light, “and he probably wouldn’t have biffed it, but, yeah, I guess that’s one way of looking at it.” Ryan was quiet for a minute, but he eventually looked at me with those big curious eyes. “How did this happen to you?”

That was the dreaded question of the hour. I didn’t want to have to explain this part. I didn’t even want to have to think about it, but I found myself telling the story anyway. “It was my accident.” My voice turned to a whisper, and then I fell into the story as if I were reliving the nightmare all over again. “It was the night of the pageant. I was so tired of all the congratulations, so Derek and I went for a drive someplace quiet. The car was parked on the side of the road, and this big tanker truck full of hazardous waste came barreling up the highway. The driver hit his brakes when he saw us, but he was moving too fast. The truck jackknifed and slid right off the road.

“The side of the tank slammed into my car and pushed it nearly fifty feet, into an electrical tower.

It was a nice night so we had the top down, and when everything smashed together the car ripped a hole in the side of the truck. This smelly green liquid started spraying all over the place. It burned, but I was pretty banged up and I couldn’t really move. The last thing I remember was the electrical tower falling on top of the car, frying everything, and the truck exploding.” Ryan’s gasp brought me back to the present, but he really startled me when he picked up my hand and squeezed it. I gave him a tiny shock, but he refused to let that stop him. I let him hold my hand for only a second before pulling away to wipe away the tears that were escaping down my face.

Ryan gave me a moment to pull myself together and then asked the only logical question. “How did you survive?”

Unfortunately, there was no logical answer. I shrugged my shoulders and pulled my knees tightly against my chest. “I should be dead,” I croaked. “Just like the truck driver. Just like Derek.” Saying Derek’s name opened a floodgate for my tears, and I buried my face in my knees as I cried.

Within seconds I felt Ryan’s arms around me. Being pulled tightly against him was probably the best feeling in the whole world, so I sank heavily into his embrace, forgetting all about the possible consequences of such an action.

Right then I wasn’t a freak. I wasn’t an ice queen. I didn’t have powers. What I had was a friend comforting me when I needed it most. Right then I was just a normal girl, and Ryan was the superhero.

I buried my face deep in his chest and wrapped my arms around him. He squeezed me tighter in return, and my tears came more forcefully, but the reason for their being there had now changed. You have no idea what a good feeling normal is until it’s taken away.

I was quite prepared to stay right where I was forever, but it didn’t exactly work out like that. My bliss was interrupted by a faint noise. “Jamie?” It sounded like Ryan, but the voice was unsteady.

“Jamie?” he said again, a little louder.

I opened my eyes to see Ryan’s arms trembling around me. He was covered in goose bumps and every hair he had was sticking straight out from his body. I would have shrieked, but I was so terrified that my voice failed me. I scrambled a safe distance from him, my nerves completely shot, and energy began to pulse through my entire body again. “Ryan!” I choked as soon as my throat allowed.

Ryan looked disoriented the same way he had after I kissed him. “It’s okay, Jamie… I’m fine… I promise…” He stumbled over his words as he spoke them. “Whatever you did, it didn’t hurt me. I’m just a little…um…overwhelmed? I think I need a minute.”

I felt sick to my stomach, thinking about what could have just happened. I knew better, and I let it go too far. But more than that, I was horrified that I had done something to him. He said

“overwhelmed,” but judging from the way he looked, he meant completely freaked out. “I am so sorry!” I pleaded while the tears returned with full force.

“It’s okay,” he promised again.

But it wasn’t okay. It was far from it. I’d done it. I’d officially scared him. And I just couldn’t face him any longer. “I should go” was the last thing I said before I disappeared from his sight.

* * * * *

Every time I closed my eyes that night, Ryan was there, holding me so tenderly that I felt as though I’d died and gone to heaven. Then I would pull away, and instead of his carefree smile I would see nothing but charred black flesh. That’s when he would crumple into a pile of ashes around me.

I used to have nightmares all the time, right after my accident. But I hadn’t had one in so long now that my parents actually came to check on me when I woke up screaming this time. I told them to forget about it and go back to bed, but sleep was a luxury I couldn’t give myself. Not after that.

As if my nightmare weren’t enough to make me feel sick, Ryan was not at school the next day.

Aside from my obvious worry about the timing of his absence, I was filled with disappointment. It had been weeks since I hadn’t come into the cafeteria and met his curious eyes. I couldn’t believe how accustomed I was to being greeted by his smile, and even worse, how much I needed it to get through the rest of my day. I wanted to kick myself for feeling so addicted to his presence, but oddly enough, I wasn’t the only one suffering from his sick day.

Only Ryan Miller could have such an effect on an entire school. He was the sunshine in this crappy prison, and without him a dark, dreary force loomed over the entire cafeteria. Or at least the popular kids’ table.

On the bright side, it was nice to know that I wasn’t the only one he had cast under his spell. Mike would grumble something to Justin every time he looked at the empty seat next to him—which nobody dared fill in Ryan’s absence—and Paige sat across from them, sulking rather pitifully. The strangest difference, however, was the empty seat next to Paige. Of course Tamika was sitting on her right, hanging on her every word as usual, but the seat on her left, Becky’s seat, was as empty as Ryan’s.

“He’d better be dying,” Mike was grumbling when I finally decided to see if they knew anything more than I did. “Coach was pissed when he ditched practice yesterday.”

“Is that why you guys had to run so many laps yesterday?” Tamika asked. The scowl on Mike’s face was an obvious yes.

“He must be really sick,” Paige said. “Maybe we should go over to his house after school and check on him.”

As much as I hate to agree with Paige on anything, I’d also thought about running over to Ryan’s house between classes. I just wanted to see if he was there and make sure he was okay, but I chickened out. If I didn’t know why he wasn’t at school, I could pretend that his parents just dragged him to some Buddha convention or something, instead of the more likely answer—that he was hanging out at home because he was too scared of me to come to school. If that were the case, it wouldn’t help any if he caught me superstalking him.

“I don’t know, Paige,” Tamika argued. “If Becky’s gone too, maybe it’s contagious. We have our first cheer competition next weekend. We can’t all get sick.”

“Becky’s not sick.” Paige had so much edge in her voice it startled everyone present, myself included. “She sat next to me in calculus this morning. I don’t know why she bothered, though. She barely even said hi.”

“Then where is she?”

“Avoiding us, obviously. She has been all week.”

“You know?” Tamika looked as if she were just now realizing the truth in Paige’s statement. “She
has
been acting really weird ever since the dance.” She giggled flirtatiously at Mike and added, “What’d you do to her?”