20
Nathaniel
Days go by. Progress is made. Work is, for once, on track and Ken hasn’t poked his head into my office in weeks. It feels like things are finally as they should be.
Almost everything.
I tell myself there isn’t time. The contract. Our extra tests in the labs. There is no time to explore what happened with our kiss. Plus, I screwed it up so majorly, I don’t know how to approach her about it. I don’t know how to explain to her that I do want to test her abilities, but I also really want her. Every moment of every day.
Julia and I spend at least a night or two together every week after everybody leaves in the lab. It’s risky, but we’ve gotten good at pretending to be normal during the day. Nobody seems to have cared or caught on.
Today in the lab we set up empty water bottles. She practices knocking them down using her powers. The first time the bottle wobbles her face lights up with a joy that nearly knocks me over. After, we order Thai take-out and discuss her growing focus. Just us two, sitting on the floor, food spread between us. She has her feet on the floor next to me. Even with our heads close, she manages to keep us from ever touching fully.
“As far as I can tell, you are emitting all types of different energy. It’s as though you can take any form of light and convert it.”
“So I can pull from any type of light?”
“I think so. Light waves are everywhere, even if you can’t see them. Energy has a wavelength. It’s always there. In theory, you could pull from anywhere on the electromagnetic spectrum. Not just visible light. I don’t know yet. I mean the power potential … What if—”
I look up to find her watching me with a dreamy expression.
“Was I rambling?”
She shrugs and smiles. “I don’t mind.”
“It’s amazing how you’re learning to control it.”
“Thanks,” she says, pretending to be extra-interested in digging out a piece of chicken from her container. She doesn’t ever want to claim credit for her sharpening talents. She makes it seem like it’s something to be ashamed of or swept under the rug.
She can now summon the glow to her hands without even trying. She’s even able to shoot little bursts from them like an actual superhero. Emotions are crucial to her powers but we can’t force those. I have some ideas of how to provoke her, but I keep my hands to myself.
Exerting little bursts has been keeping her happy and healthy too. She came up with a code to tell me how she’s feeling; she said she and a friend use a one to ten scale. She hasn’t had a day over four on her pain scale in weeks. What’s more is the Lite-Brite tests have been going fine. So while I don’t want her to have any lingering guilt about the previous failures, it’s clear that she was, in fact, impacting them.
We haven’t touched since that day in her house. Not really. But I have noticed her become more free with touching others. Sometimes, she’ll nudge my knee in a meeting or poke my arm as she walks by. It never fails to make me smile.
She catches me staring too long at her as she’s talking. She smiles sadly. I focus on the conversation here and now.
“One time he was in the back of my car,” I say, sharing a story I haven’t thought of in years. “I didn’t realize until I got back to my dorm—three hours away.”
“No!” She covers her mouth as she laughs around her mouthful.
“It was my third year of undergrad and Lincoln was eight, I think. He wanted to come live with me.” My voice breaks off. I thought it would be a funny story but I understand that he must have already sensed what was coming. I clear my throat at the sudden shame.
“Lincoln’s so young,” I say. “I forget sometimes, because he’s so big and so much more mature than I was at his age. I don’t know where his unshakable confidence comes from. I never had that. I was always too …”
I’m not quite ready to share all the darkest moments of my history with her. I don’t want it clouding how she sees me.
“I know where he gets it,” she says. “Don’t underestimate your role in his life.”
I frown. “I should be there for him more.” I don’t say anything about our father. About the bruises. Instead, I say, “He needs to know that he is loved and safe. I need to be that person for him. I need to keep him safe.”
“I think you do that for him.” She reaches across and squeezes my hand. The contact is warm and nice and too quick. When I try to hold on, she pulls away.
“His home life isn’t … great. I just want to be a reliable person in his life.”
“Lincoln admires you so much. It’s obvious.”
I scoff. “I don’t think so. I’m just his chubby, nerdy older brother. He got all the cool.”
