"You like her, don't you, Alex?" Vlad asks.
"Shut up, Vladdie, and stay out of my head, okay? You have no idea how annoying that is." Aleksandar retorts. He then turns to me.
"Okay, Cameo. Now that we are formally introduced, I can tell you what's going on."
I lean back against the sofa, expecting the familiar feeling of falling back into an unknown universe. It doesn't happen.
"Don't worry about zoning here. We rotate the furniture so we don't confuse the clairvoyants." Aleksandar continues.
"Okay." he continues. "Let me explain. The Inside is a small covert group of supernaturally sensitive people ranging from the ages of 11-25. There's no age cutoff, but the general population is 11-25. Our eleven year old is the girl with the Spongebob shirt, and our oldest is...actually, he's not here right now. Well anyway, we are either supernaturally sensitive or are blessed with supernatural gifts. I personally am simply supernaturally sensitive. I can tell if a person has powers or not, and when they're lying. Then you've got people like Vlad and Delaina. People with manifested powers. Delaina's been blessed with telekinesis, which is why lights turn on and off. She turns on light switches with her head. She's a blast on Halloween. Vlad can read minds, as I am sure you are now aware of." he says, giving Vlad a look.
"You, on the other hand, are a clairvoyant. Clairvoyants are middlemen, both sensitive to the spirit world around you, and manifest with powers. Best and worst of both worlds. You've got your pre-cognates, your people who can see into the future, your people who can see things as they happen, very useful, actually. Then there's you. You are what is known as a retrocognate. You can see into the past. That's why you overload when confronted with history. Your brain doesn't know how to process it, so you zone out, leading to some trippy experiences. Your childhood zoning wasn't seizures, so you were probably on anticonvulsants as a child for nothing. They were psychic experiences. I expect you were especially good at history?" I nod. He continues. "That's because you absorbed the history of the picture in the textbooks, or a quote heard in class. Anything with any sort of past, you absorbed like a sponge. Tha'ts because you don't know how to control your abilities. You learn that, your zoning episodes are over. Unless, of course, you want a drug free trip out experience." he finishes.
It's a lot of information to process. As I'm sitting there, taking it all in, Aleksandar watches Delaina over my shoulder. He's observing her, working her social magic on the mohawk dude. Vladimir notices this.
"Alex, if you want to go get her, you can. As her best friend, I totally approve. Go get her buddy." he says with the same humor in his voice that he uses to calm me down. Aleksandar smiles, flips his brother off, then gets up, moving toward Delaina.
Leaving Vlad and I alone on the IKEA sofa. I just sit there, watching the room interact with each other. Finally, he breaks the silence.
"Hey, umm...you asked how I always know what to say to you before..."
"No I didn't."
He smiles. "I'm the mindreader, I think I'd know."
I relent. "Okay, I'll bite. How, minus the mindreading, do you know exactly what to...?"
He interrupts me. "Because I just know. Because I think I get you. Because I find you very interesting, not to mention," here he leans into my ear. "mindbogglingly attractive."
Now I actually feel my face growing redder and hotter by the second. The first guy I meet on my third day in Chicago, and I'm a fire engine every time he talks to me. Considering how pale I am generally, and how dark my hair is, I must look like an effing tomato.
My cell phone rings. I answer it.
"Cameo, where the hell are you?" It's Ashleigh. Crap. I must have stayed later than I thought.
"Hey, Ash. I'm sorry, I guess I lost track of time. I'm on my way home."
Her voice drops a few points on the shrill scale. I guess she was worried. "Okay, Cammie. It's about 7:30 now, so try to be home by 9, okay?"
"Sure. Talk to you when I get home. Bye." I hang up. Vlad looks at me quizzically.
" Need a ride home?"
~*~*~*~
After a silent drive to the front of my Victorian house, he pulls into the driveway, and we just sit in the van as I wonder what to say. After his speech in the house today, Im not sure what to say. I mean, it's not like I don't think he's a nice guy, but I don't know him like that. I'd definitely like to, though. He's intriguing, and at the same time, very sweet.
He turns to me. "Thanks for coming out today."
"No problem." I answer. I got some of the answers I needed, which is always a plus. And I made some friends, and learned the name of the mysterious welcome basket carrying Russian hot guy who lives near me. All in all, a productive day.
"I'm from Serbia." he says with a smile. Damn. He may be nice, and he may be excessively pretty, but I've got to watch what I think around him.
"Really?" I ask. Interesting.
"Yeah. You were close though."
We don't talk for awhile. I'm trying very hard not to think anything stupid, and I am wishing that I could read minds.
"Well, I kind of have to go now. Thanks for the ride, Vladimir."
"Call me Vlad." he says as he hugs me goodbye.
"Okay." I say as I open the door and climb out of the car. I walk toward my house, and as I'm taking out my set of keys, I notice him watching me, making sure I get in safe.
He waves goodbye, then pulls away, heading home. I open my door, and enter the house, to find Ashleigh watching Gossip Girl and eating a slice of pizza.
'Hey, Cammie. Pizza's in the kitchen. How was school?"
"Ehh, uneventful."
"Meet any new friends? Join any clubs?"
I smile to myself as I get a slice of pepperoni and think of Delaina, Aleksandar, Vlad, and of course, the mysterious organization known as the Inside.
"You could say that."
No comments:
Post a Comment