by Darrell Bain
Sunday night, Amber woke again while Bailey and her mom were having sex, but this time there was a difference. Amber tried very hard to shut off the sensations coming to her, and it worked to a degree. There was a certain way she had to think, like moving her mind behind a door, and it curtailed the intensity down to a bearable level that was more like a fuzzy dream than really connecting to other minds. She thought that, with a little more practice, she would be able to shut off any unwanted thought, even from Jimmy and Jeannie if she wanted to. It made her feel better until she got to school Monday.
* * * *
The first surprise at school Monday was how easy it was now was to tell what the other kids in the group were thinking when they were nearby, especially if the thoughts were emotional in nature. Sometimes she didn't even have to look at them to know, like with Breiley and Al. They were so enamored with each other that when they were together it was like sitting next to them while they were into heavy gravitizing, the catchword for kissing and fondling. It wasn't too bad, though, because, as she had hoped, practice made shutting off outside thoughts easier. With the optimism of youth, she was already beginning to think they could work it out—until her midmorning class with Mrs. Larkin.
* * * *
When the teacher looked directly at Amber the first time, the young girl paled at the unalloyed hate emanating from Larkin's mind, most of it directed at her. Two other kids in the group got some attention, but Larkin focused on Amber more than anyone in the class. It scared her so badly that she felt nauseated, like she was close to a bad smell and unable to move away. She felt her chin quiver with anticipation at having to talk to Larkin if she was called upon, which she naturally was.
"Miss Morrison, please stand up and recite your first two metaphors."
Amber slowly got to her feet, but she was unable to speak. She tried to shut off the raw waves of loathing coming from Larkin, but the talent was still too new; she had never experienced anything comparable to Larkin's hatred before. Thoughts skittered wildly in her head, the ones from Larkin cold and fearsome and heavy with a burgeoning desire to see her subdued.
"Well?” Larkin's voice was cutting, heavy with sarcastic hatred, though Amber doubted anyone other than the two kids of the group could tell, and even they weren't feeling what she was.
Amber stood mute.
Larkin cocked her hip in a disparaging attitude. “Didn't do your assignment, is that it? Very well, sit down."
An impression of gloating satisfaction mixed with the still perceptible hatred immersed Amber's mind like a malevolent miasma settling into her mind. She covered her face and forced it away, closing it up behind an imaginary door.
Larkin ignored her obvious distress and went on to the next pupil.
"Mister Meekins, perhaps you deigned to compose a couple of metaphors for us?"
"Yes Ma'am,” the boy said and began reading from his PPC.
Amber was visibly shaking by the time the class was over. She brushed off attempts by other students to find out what was the matter with her, longing desperately for the lunch break.
Even then, she wasn't left alone. Jeannie was on the opposite lunch period. Amber and Jimmy were sitting by themselves in a corner, holding hands across the table and talking between bites of their lunch. Their seclusion and attitude told their classmates almost as plainly as words that they wished to be by themselves so long as other seats were available. Amber was telling Jimmy of how intensely Larkin hated the group in general, the three of them in particular. She was so immersed in relating how she had finally been able to shut off Larkin's seething hatred and gloating that she failed to notice Jordan Rhieman, the overage eighth grader approaching. His deep, confident voice startled her when it interrupted.
"Hey, Gamehen Cutie, this underage Dunce ain't got the nuts and bolts for Practice. Meet me at the arbor after prison, and I'll show you some real gravitizing."
Amber squeezed Jimmy's hand. He was holding his temper in check with admirable restraint, just like the martial arts classes taught. Amber looked up at Jordan and, for the second time that day, was sickened at the ferocity of someone else's thoughts. Jordy was running degrading images of her through his mind like a succession of porno flipclicks. She shut it off as quickly as she could and said, “I'd sooner go wallowing with a pig, Jordan. Why don't you go somewhere and clip your dirty toenails? Or maybe just turn it backward. That's about all you're good for."
Jordan's face flamed as he realized the conversation had been overheard form a nearby table and that he was being laughed at
Jimmy couldn't help grinning. In the parlance of teen slang, Amber had just told him to go screw himself because no one else would.
Jordan glared at Jimmy. “Later, little man."
"Oh, shupcreek. Now he'll be after me,” Jimmy said.
"I'm sorry, Jimmy; it just popped out."
"Don't worry about it; he had it coming. Besides, he's a broke rock if I ever saw one, and he's not as tough as he thinks he is."
Amber examined Jimmy across the table from her. In her mind's eye, she could grasp a gestalt of him. It was surprising; she suddenly realized how much he had matured lately. His shoulders were widening and muscles stood out beneath his shirt from the martial arts training. He was also getting taller. It's like me developing into a woman. We're growing up, she thought.
Jimmy smiled at her as he caught the vagrant thought, and she returned it with a mental gesture that said, “Kiss later."
* * * *
For Amber, the rest of the week passed in a haze of barely remembered classes while she and Jeannie and Jimmy learned how to control the new path their minds had taken. She and Jimmy spent more time together than the three of them did, leading to their talent getting ahead of Jeannie's. It irked the other girl, but there was nothing Amber could do about it other than try to spend as much time with her as she could. She wanted to encourage Jimmy to do the same, but it wasn't that easy. With the talent came an awareness that Jeannie wanted Jimmy almost as much as she did. She had known of the attraction before, of course, but now it was even more in the open with the three of them. The worst part of it was that, in the back of her mind, Amber thought Jeannie would wind up doing something foolish when she realized finally and fully that Jimmy belonged to her and no one else.
On the way home from school Friday, after Jeannie had peeled off at her street, Amber and Jimmy continued on, not talking much but holding hands and play-bumping hip and shoulder. It felt so good being with him that she wished Jeannie had a boyfriend, too.
"Am I your boyfriend?” Jimmie asked, seriously.
Amber stopped to kiss him, and they continued on. “Uh huh,” she said. “I guess we'll get married one day. No one else would suit us."
"That's a long way off."
"I know.” They halted again in front of Jimmie's house.
"Have we decided what to do yet?” Amber asked, already knowing the answer.
"Let's give it some more time,” Jimmy said, knowing she was speaking of revealing the new development to Bailey and her mother. “They might take it wrong."
"I don't think they would, not that much. Mom and Bailey want to protect us."
"I still say wait,” Jimmy said. “Why hurry with it before we have to?"
"I guess so,” Amber agreed reluctantly.
* * * *
Amber was eating an early lunch, waiting on Jimmy to return from his ball practice and stay the afternoon while his parents were gone. Jeannie had already told her she couldn't come though she was evasive about her reason for why not, and it was impossible to tell what she was thinking over the phone from where she was at the big mall across town. The distance from which they could touch each other's mind was gradually increasing, but it didn't reach that far yet.
Amber was just finishing her glass of milk when she felt the impact of Jimmy's unrestrained mind in a confrontation with ... Jordy Rhieman! The unexpected shock was forceful but not as wrought with anger as the first time.<
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"Something's going on outside!” Bailey said, looking up from his easy chair.
Amber could hear it too now that she concentrated on the noises rather than thoughts. Shouts and epithets being hurled like spears at Jimmy! She had the door open and was preparing to race outside when Bailey caught her arm.
"Wait,” he said from the open door.
Amber stared at him wildly for a second then realized that Jimmy was in no real danger. She looked past Bailey and partway down the street to where Jordy and one of his friends had lain in wait, intending to give Jimmy a beating. Instead it looked more like a superbly skilled matador playing with two confused young bulls.
Jimmy was laughing at them as he avoided every single swing or kick by the other two boys, dancing just out of reach or stepping to the side or ducking at the last moment.
Bailey watched for several moments while holding Amber. It was only when he felt the presence of Pat behind him that he finally moved. “Stay here,” he said.
When Jordan and his friend saw Bailey coming near, they broke off the fight, such as it was. Both were huffing and puffing from exertion while Jimmy had hardly stirred a hair on his head.
"Go home,” Bailey told the older boys sternly.
They hurried away, looking glad of an excuse to retreat while they had a chance and before Jimmy decided to really fight.
"Come inside,” Bailey said to Jimmy. He had watched the confrontation carefully before deciding to break it up. What he saw was disturbing. Jimmy hadn't even had to see the assailant when either of them tried to rush him from behind while the other tried keeping him busy from the front. It was like he had eyes in the back of his head—or something equally alien.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
"Those devil-bred children are not normal,” Nora Larkin insisted. “I swear they can read minds, and the Morrison girl and her boyfriend, that Jimmy Gomez, are the worst. I'm afraid of them. The government should do something.” Larkin sipped at the coffee she had brewed when Sean Casey came to her home.
"Unfortunately, the government doesn't seem interested, Nora. That's why I resigned from the FBI; I want to protect us normal people.” Casey had progressed to a first name basis with Larkin and Caralee Shaeffer, still the principal of Mountain Grove Middle School. “However, I wanted to touch base with you again this weekend because I've managed to get in contact with some organizations which do care about normal people. Believe me, they do.” He eyed her over his coffee cup, thinking how easy she was to manipulate. Like most people who got a fixed idea in their mind, she hung on to it like a bulldog. Though, in her case, he thought it was justified. The more he learned about the kids from the terrorist attack, the ones who had been very young then, the more he liked it—now that he saw a way where he might gain financially from them.
Larkin sniffed, an embellishment to speech she used frequently. “Well, someone should care. In any case, I have something new for you. I told you about Jordan Rhieman, the boy I have reporting to me. He called me last night because something odd happened."
Casey leaned forward. “Tell me."
"Jimmy Gomez insulted Jordan, and Jordan and his friend Henry Keller were going to teach him a lesson.” Anger suffused her features as she remembered the conversation.
"I take it that the lesson didn't work?"
"Hah! That devil boy is a mind reader, I tell you! Two against one and they couldn't even touch him, much less strike a blow! Tell me that's not mind reading!"
"Tell me more, Nora, please.” This was getting even more interesting. Casey was working as a broker for a big distributor of counterfeit drugs, a huge, world wide business. He had been amazed to learn that up to a third of all the drugs in the world were counterfeit, most of them made with more or less the right ingredients but without a license or patent to do so and with little quality control. They were sold wholesale to middle men who packaged the bulk contents and provided counterfeit labels. It was such a widespread practice that governments simply couldn't stop it, not with the price of prescription drugs spiraling ever upward. What would his bosses pay for someone who could ferret out government agents or customs agents susceptible to bribes? Millions, he'd found. The narcotics trade would be worth even more because he suspected his boss was connected to the barons of the narcotics industry. Since that bastard doctor had forced him to leave the FBI, Casey's standard of living had gone up. He was enjoying the fine life now and had no intention of ever going back to an ordinary job, even if he could. He had thoroughly convinced himself it was Bailey's fault he had failed to be promoted, and that was the reason he had resigned. He couldn't admit to himself that fear of exposure was the primary reason.
Larkin continued her story. “As I said, the other boys couldn't touch Jimmy, even when one of them got behind him. And that's not all. One of the school counselors is a friend of mine. She says a couple of those damned kids, the boys, are taking advantage of ordinary girls. It's horrible! They read minds and know just what to do in order to seduce them!"
"Is Jimmy one of them?"
"No, I told you he has a girl friend, that slutty Morrison brat. They're probably doing it in alleys if you ask me. Little bitch, always reading my mind and knowing what I'm going to ask on tests. She and her friend, Jeannie Burger. Talk about a slut; she's even worse!"
Casey let the school teacher ramble and rant while he tried to sort out whether and when she was revealing facts or simply complaining. Most of the time he felt she was truthful though misinterpreting some of what she had learned. Shaeffer's reports told much the same story. He had them both eating out of his hand, partly for spite and partly because now he could supplement their meager salaries. Teachers were even more underpaid than FBI agents. Still, he knew he had to move carefully. He thought he had retrieved all the data that Greenleigh bitch had hacked for the doctor, but he couldn't be sure, even after all the injections and forced questioning before he killed her. Remembering her always gave him pleasure. She was so small and petite that it had been almost as good as having a young girl gagged and tied up for him to play with. The thought that he might be free to act in ways like that again motivated him now—especially in light of the latest developments. He stopped Larkin's accusatory complaints when she began repeating herself.
"Nora, let's get back to that fight. Do you think the Rhieman boy was being truthful or maybe exaggerating because the Gomez kid was whipping both of them?"
"I watched Amber Morrison in class today. I saw the look on her face when I thought certain things. Every time, she blanched. I did the same thing with the Burger girl when I passed her in the hall and got the same reaction. I tell you, they can read minds! I think maybe all of them can, but I'm absolutely certain about those three."
Casey nodded. He began wondering what he could do to confirm Nora's certainty. Then he saw it. Of course! She was telling him exactly how to do it. All he had to do was show himself to the three kids and think about what he'd like to do to them in order to see how they reacted! It wouldn't be giving anything away since he was here under his very carefully assumed new identity. Suppose the kids did report it? What could they do? He wouldn't be doing anything illegal, and there certainly wouldn't be a record of him even being in Mountain Grove this time. Not under his real name, anyway. Once he confirmed they were actually reading minds, he knew just who to see after that. Brazos, his boss. It would mean going deeper into the realm of the drug cartels since he was all but sure Brazos was connected, but he didn't mind. He could take care of himself.
* * * *
Bailey wasn't really angry, but once inside the house, he spoke sternly to Jimmy. “Son, don't you know acting like that will get around? Those boys won't take lightly to being made fools of. Now they'll really start people talking about you being mind readers, and from what I just saw, I'm not so sure you aren't."
Jimmy glanced at Amber before thinking, confirming what Bailey had surmised. Bailey sighed. “Look Jimmy—and you, too, Amber. I know I've told you to keep thi
s stuff to yourself, but if you've learned something new, Pat and I need to know so we can protect you.” He eyed the youths with his kindly gaze, hoping they would continue to trust he and Pat with their talents, which appeared to be expanding if what he had just seen was an indication.
"I'm sorry, Doctor Bailey. I guess I wasn't racking very good. Those broke rock idiots were thinking bad stuff about Amber, and she called them on it. I was sitting with her and got involved. I guess they were trying to take it out on me."
Bailey almost laughed at the mixture of slang with contrition and at the boy calling him “Doctor Bailey” as if he were still a patient, but he did interpret the slanguage correctly.
"Did you ... uh ... hear what they were thinking too, Amber?"
"Yes, sir.” She looked toward her mother. “I'm sorry, Mom. We didn't want to say anything yet. It's still so new and ... well, sometimes its embarrassing. It's not really like hearing. It's more ... more...” She stopped, bewildered. She was at a loss trying to explain a phenomenon confined to the three of them, one she didn't fully understand herself.
"Is it embarrassing just for you, or would other people be embarrassed, too?” Pat asked, wondering just what her daughter was turning into.
Amber had trouble meeting either of their gazes and hesitated to say anything. It was Jimmy who broke the silence.
"I guess we better tell them now,” he said.
"Hmm. Tell you what,” Bailey suggested. “Pat, why don't you get the youngsters a Coke or some tea while I make us a drink, and then we'll talk.” He grinned at the boy and girl. “You two are going to cause me to have to buy some more bourbon if this keeps up.” He and Pat went to the bar and kitchen respectively.
Amber readily perceived that whatever they said, Bailey could deal with it. She thought her mother could, too. While they were out of the room, Jimmy touched her arm. She turned to look at him and after a moment nodded. Words weren't really necessary, but she used them anyway. “Yeah, we better ‘fess up. Don't be shy about telling how this started, Jimmy. You know they just want to help us."