Scott

For the first time since I developed telepathy, I felt like I was getting some actual studying done. I was sitting on an upper level of the campus library, by a window overlooking the foggy city. The tables around me were mostly empty. It was quiet. It was nice. Such a needed change from all the people I had to worry about and shield myself from in the halls and dining commons.

The view out the window tempted my concentration every few minutes while I worked, but the instrumental rock on StreamFree kept my thoughts from wandering too far. Thank the gods. Now I was caught up in religious studies, and my statistics homework was coming along.

My phone buzzed.

Nick: I want to hang out with you tonight but I know the guys are going to want to hang

Nick’s words made me smile, despite bringing me out of my work.

Scott: Then let’s hang with them for a bit then ditch them for my place?

Nick: Good idea. This is why you’re going to college.

I rolled my eyes, and reread the next statistics problem. I’d need linear regression for this, for sure. I flipped back through the chapter to get the exact equation, and my phone rang. Mom.

Since the floor was so deserted, I just answered it. “Everything okay?”

“I wish, Scotty. I don’t know if things are going to be okay anymore.”

Tulio condemn I have one event-free day. “What happened?”

“We had our first therapy session.” There was a lot of background noise, so she was probably driving.

“Didn’t go well?”

“I prayed, Scotty. I prayed and prayed for you and your sister to remain normal. To save the whole family this situation. I’m so sorry. I must not have prayed hard enough.”

“So Laesth has a bigger plan for us than Natalis did? That’s okay.”

She sighed. “How can you stand that I’ve done this to you?”

I sucked in a breath, and tried to stay my shock so she wouldn’t hear it in my voice. “I’m actually excited to be an eccentric.”

Whooshing of traffic. “Are you really?”

“Why wouldn’t I be? I mean, it’s kinda fun? But it’s hard to figure out Laesth’s plan for me when I’m worrying about you and Dad.” The words tumbled out of me and not all of them were true. I could only use “fun” in the context of my connection with Nick. But maybe reassuring her would help.

“I wish you weren’t so far away from me right now. I miss you so much.”

“I miss you too, Mom.” I stared at the paragraphs and tables in my stats book. “You didn’t answer how the therapy went.”

“We’re talking through the most likely ways for you to have inherited telepathy from my side of the family.”

I rolled my eyes, even if she couldn’t see it. “Why to Natalis are you not telling him the truth about you?”

“He doesn’t like magic. His family doesn’t like magic. We’ve kept you kids out of those conversations as much as we could.”

“But he loves you,” I urged. “Do you really think telling him you have telepathy is going to change that?”

“I don’t know.” A turn indicator ticked as I waited for her to elaborate.

“Damn it, Mom, Natalis would want you to tell him.” I pounded my book, and my pencil rolled off the table.

“I know, and . . . I do want to tell him. But I can’t take the risk. You haven’t been in love and built a relationship with someone. You don’t know how fragile relationships are.”

My jaw hung open, that she would pull that kind of line on me. I was glad she wasn’t close enough to hear me think Bullshit. “So you think Dad believing you cheated is better than him learning you’ve hidden magic from him?”

“Natalis hold me, Scotty, I don’t want to get lectured from you too.”

What was a worse aspect of character? Infidelity or chronic lying? Gods, I was so mad now. I picked up my pencil, hitting my head on the edge of the table as I went to sit back up. With a muffled swear, I tried to keep going.

“Did you think at all about what would happen if I did get telepathy? What if Kat gets it too?”

“Scott.”

I gritted my teeth. “I’m not going to say sorry for that.”

“I have to go, Scotty.” Mom said, her words curt. “Kat’s walking up to the car.”

“Love you,” I said automatically.

“Love you too.”

I folded my arms in front of me and rested my head in them with a groan. Imagined the ConnectUs update. Maddy Kensington has added a new life event: Telepathy. Arthur Kensington has ended a relationship with Maddy Kensington. Dislike. Sad face.

That was all fucking ridiculous. And I couldn’t handle it. I packed up my books and texted Nick.

Scott: Gods damned looking forward to hanging with you tonight.

Nick: Ditto.

Our plan to hang out worked pretty well too. I had dinner with the group, and when the guys queued up some car racing game, Nick and I slipped out under the guise of me helping him with an English essay.

When we shut the door of my dorm, I breathed a sigh and collapsed into my desk chair. Nick kicked off his shoes and climbed onto my loft bed.

“What are ya doing up there?” I asked, peeking over the side.

“Relaxing. That okay?”

Joining him on my bed could very easily lead to . . . things. And it wasn’t that I didn’t want things to happen, but I wasn’t sure if I could handle that kind of complication on top of everything else right now.

Nick leaned toward me and rested his chin on crossed arms. “You’re thinking about something serious.”

“Yeah.”

He kept gazing at me. His eyes were gentle, his breathing relaxed. No pressure, no impatience.

I’m not ready to have sex with you yet, I told him.

Nick smiled and shrugged his shoulders. “That’s fine.”

“I’m sorry.”

“There’s more to hanging out with cute guys than sticking dicks in stuff. You know, like my next lesson.”

I chuckled and pushed my shoes off next to his before joining him on the loft bed. Nick scooted against the wall, and I crawled next to him and flopped onto my back. This was pretty nice. Exactly what I wanted.

“So my next topic builds off what I said last time, where eccentrics should help the people around them.”

“That’s basically what the gods say magic is for,” I said, smiling up at my ceiling with my hands behind my head.

“Well, yeah. But what comes next is that some start thinking like this,” and he gestured at his shirt, which was another comic book character.

“They think they’re a hero?” I guessed.

“Yep. Today’s lesson is that not every eccentric is a hero. But that’s okay.”

I raised an eyebrow at him, as I definitely didn’t have any delusions of grandeur. But helping my parents would make me the hero of the family . . . if it worked. “Go on.”

“When my telekinesis came in, I thought I was the coolest guy in the world and could do anything. Then I realized I couldn’t. I was actually . . . well, normal. But I’ve seen some guys get all worked up over being eccentric. Like, what’s my purpose? What’s my point? And the thing is, sometimes there isn’t a point. There’s enough eccentrics that most of us get to sit back and enjoy it.”

That sure did sound like me talking to Laesth the other day. “You really believe you won’t have a moment in your life where having magic makes a difference?”

“Psh, I’m not a healer.” He smiled and glanced over at me. “I’m a regular guy with regular telekinesis. Nothing extraordinary is going to come from something I’ve done. But that’s my whole point. I don’t need to be a hero to be happy with my magic and myself. You don’t need to be special. Because you’re awesome just the way you are.”

“Metaphorical ‘you,’ or me specifically?” I asked, and Nick laughed.

“Both.”

His words were sweet but didn’t sit well. “Are you saying my telepathy won’t really impact my life?”

“No, it definitely will. But there’s a difference between your magic impacting your life and making it better, or easier, or less stressful, and you convincing yourself that your magic is all you need to be great.”

So essentially I shouldn’t be self-centered enough to think that I alone could change what was going on with my parents, and yeah, I could agree with that. I nodded, and Nick continued.

“When you expect to get magic, you might daydream about being a prodigy. Or having a rare version of your magic. And when you inevitably don’t . . .” He shrugged. “It’s really annoying. You get mad at the gods. Or maybe that was just me. I dunno.”

“No, it totally makes sense,” I said. But there was something missing, some contradiction to what I had learned growing up. As I puzzled it out, Nick’s telekinesis caressed my arm, then flickered down my side. I spasmed with a laugh as I tried to fend off hands that weren’t there. Our eyes met, and my mind went blank.

He gazed at me through the corner of his glasses, his eyes half-shut and his smirk all the proof I needed that he was thinking dirty thoughts about us. Which meant I was now thinking dirty thoughts. Which meant my shielding would probably go to shit again.

“I was trying to figure something out,” I said, and he raised an eyebrow. “It was important.”

“Sorry?” His telekinesis tickled down my stomach. I screeched and used his shins as leverage to push away from him. He snickered and went at me with his magic again.

“Gods damn it, Nick, fucking—” I kept wiggling and scooting back until suddenly I started falling off the edge of the bed, and I had barely frozen with panic before I felt the grip of Nick’s telekinesis strong on my shoulders and hips.

“Gotcha.”

I breathed heavily, pulling myself firmly back onto the bed. “Asshole. And also thanks, I guess.”

Nick shook his head. I took several breaths, my arms trembling, our conversation resurfaced and swirled through me.

“No, don’t you dare,” he said. I frowned at him. “I did not save your life, or save you from major harm. I just used my magic for one of its many basic purposes.”

“B-but if you hadn’t had telekinesis—”

“Then I would have been tickling you with my hands and would have caught you with my arms.”

Okay, he had a point. “Fine.” But it did remind me what I had been thinking about. “So hear me out. Most of the epistles are about the gods doing incredible things with their magic. Things that are heroic and all that kind of stuff that you’re trying to tell me that us mortals shouldn’t aspire to.”

Nick’s nose scrunched. “Well of course not, they’re gods.”

“But we have the same magic.”

“That doesn’t make me a god. Or you a god. We’re humans with fancy parlor tricks.”

I rolled my eyes. “Tell that to someone who has a fatal wound healed.”

“No, man, that’s healing. You can’t apply any of my argument to healing because that’s in a completely different . . .” he sighed. “Level. Plane. Whatever. I’m telling you, you don’t want to go into this eccentric business feeling godlike.”

I waited for him to continue, his brow furrowed and his lips pouted and his glasses askew on his face, probably from our scuffle. Finally, he met my eyes again.

“You’ll just end up disappointed in yourself.”

He fixed his glasses and looked away, but despite the solemn mood, I couldn’t take my eyes off him. His straight black hair was all messy, and his shirt had pulled up enough to reveal plaid boxers and a sliver of soft tanned skin.

“I used to imagine what it would be like to be eccentric,” I said, running a fingertip along his exposed stomach. He jerked in surprise. “How if I had fire, how it would feel in my palm. If I had healing, how I would help people. But it was the kind of make-believe that little kids do. Flying and breathing underwater and dragons and whatever. Magic for me was in the same category as make-believe.”

“Flying is real,” he said, his eyebrow quirking, and yes, I shot him a stare of hard skepticism. “It’s a rare form of telekinesis where you can lift yourself really well. I absolutely don’t have it.”

“You’re kidding me.”

But then Nick swept his phone into the air before us, and he brought up an article on the EncycloWeb. He read from the top. “Flying: telekinesis rare form. Most recent known eccentric being Joseph Longfellow, Old Britain, second age 534.”

“Wow,” I managed, scooting closer to him until the air between us was warm. “I mean, I know about rare healing forms, and the Empress’s fireballs. But this?”

“The older a magic is, the more rare forms it has,” Nick said.

And of course, healing was the oldest, so it had the most. I held up a hand and counted them off. “Autohealing. Mental specialist. Animal specialist. Am I missing any?”

“If my comics are to be trusted at all, resurrection.”

“No way, I thought only Sanya could do that.” I rested my head on his arm, and I felt a shudder run down him. “So, tunneling doesn’t have any rare forms ’cause it’s the newest. Though, in the Collections, some tunnelers can send a person through a portal.”

“To the gods, that would be more useful than the dinner-plate-sized mail service portals we have now.”

I laughed, and Nick’s fingers slipped down my shoulder and he gave me a squeeze. My breath caught, and my heart hammered, and how much of me could he hear?

“How about telepathy rare forms?” I asked, to try to distract myself. “Laesth has the ability to read other people’s minds, and there’s other telepaths in the Collections that can influence people’s decisions.”

“Receptive telepathy and persuasive telepathy,” Nick said. “But as far as rare forms go, receptivity is not super rare. At least ten percent of telepaths. I think that’s one of the reasons all telepaths register.”

“Like the better healers?”

“Yes, but I mean all telepaths. Everyone.”

I frowned. “So I need to register? That’s . . . kinda scary.”

“Only if you’re afraid of a draft.”

“Not funny.”

Nick’s fingers drummed on my arm, and he let out a breath. “You’re right, it’s not.”

I sighed, a spike of anxiety still working its way through me as we lay quietly, him caressing my arm and my hand still resting on his hip. Slowly, I calmed, and maybe my emotions gave me away, because then he brought his other hand up to my cheek and ran a fingernail down the side of my face, just light enough to tickle and completely melt my insides.

“Have you ever heard the saying that people are like onions? Because they have so many layers?” he asked, that fingernail tracing down my neck until I shuddered. “Your telepathy is like a rose. You’re blooming, opening up so I can see all the petals. All your emotions.”

There was a thrill in not knowing if he was right, and not knowing if I cared, because the way he said it made me feel wanted and made me equally want. Then his palm slipped up my arm, and my arm curled around his waist. Despite his warm skin and the warm air between us, I still shivered.

“We don’t have to . . .” he started as I leaned into him until our noses almost touched.

“Nope.”

We kissed, my shiver continuing down my spine. I flexed my hips against his as I gripped him tightly, and his stomach pressed softly into mine. His hand found purchase between my shoulder blades, and his other touched my neck, and with the pressure of telekinesis against my back and hips, he kept me in place, enveloped by him. It was strangely secure and comforting, being held so completely.

And my mind wasn’t so much on the dirty thoughts and the what-ifs but on the this is so nice and I could kiss him forever and that was fine. That didn’t mean I wasn’t turned on, but I could deal and still enjoy this.

Nick pulled away and breathed hot air against my wet lips. “We aren’t going to do it. That’s fine. But if we were, I’d see how well I could hold you down with no hands.”

I froze, my breath coming out in little hiccups of want. “Yeah?”

He tilted my head to the side with a magical push and kissed my neck. “Or I’d see if I could get you off with telekinesis while I enjoyed you from behind.”

“To the gods,” I managed, and he snickered, slipping his hand under my shirt to run nails along my side.

He went to town on my neck again, his slick tongue crossing all sorts of wires in my head. I groaned, my thoughts jumbling.

Oh gods, yes, you dirty piece of shit how dare you fucking make me want you don’t stop touching me damn it all.

Nick laughed, pushed his glasses up, and then took them off and floated them down away the bed, out of my sight. I gripped him and kissed him hard, and as he sucked in a breath between my teeth and tongue, his hand plunged beneath my boxers to get a handful of asscheek.

“Fuck . . .” I groaned, trying to remember why I didn’t want to bone him right here, right now and failing pretty badly. Something about . . . gods, uh, something about . . .

Oh. My goddamned parents divorcing.

Nick stopped necking me and pulled away with a slow exhale. Guess he heard that.

“Right.”

I whined and buried my face in his chest, and he released my ass and surrounded me with another hug. We stayed that way for a while, and I had no idea what thoughts got to him and which didn’t. They were mostly me feeling sorry for my parents, for me and Kat, for him getting involved with a guy who couldn’t concentrate long enough to have a proper make-out session.

“Nah, this is nice.”

Oh, that part got through. With his arms still tight around me, magical eddies flowed up my neck, pushing gently, but firmly enough to feel like a light massage.

Please keep going, I purred at him.

“I don’t mind your thoughts, by the way,” Nick said, as his massage calmed me into sleepiness.

I ran a palm down his smooth arm, my eyelids heavy. “I know.”

At some point, I must have fallen asleep. When I opened my eyes, the room was dark, and Nick was snoring next to me. Sounds behind me caught my attention, and I rolled over to find Mark at his desk, reading by the light of his desk lamp.

“Hey, sorry, Nick and I, uh,” I tried.

He nodded in greeting. “You guys have fun?”

“I don’t—we’re not going out—well, maybe we are, but—”

Mark shrugged. “No problem if you are, duh.”

I smiled. “Cool.”