“Are you sure you’re okay?” she asked me.
Time to act normal. I cleared my throat.
“Yeah. So, there’s a party next week for the end of the school year. I was wondering if I could maybe go with Jay, if it’s okay.” I thought of Scott and hoped she’d say yes.
Patti sniffed and twitched her nose.
“Will this person’s parents be there?” she asked in a tight tone.
Would they? “I don’t know.”
“Well, I’ll need to talk to them first. If it’s just a small get-together with parental supervision, then I’ll consider it.”
Sheesh. Patti made it seem like I was prone to bad behavior or something. Me! The school’s Little Miss Goody-Goody. I didn’t understand why she couldn’t trust me. I must have been pouting, because she set the paper down and gave me a consoling pat on the arm.
“You still want to get your license after school today, hon?”
“Yes,” I answered. Because that was what normal sixteen-year-olds did. And I would feign normalcy if it killed me.
“All right. And then dinner at La Tía’s?”
“Yes!” I said, my mood lightening. Mexican food was our favorite. We went to the little rinky-dink restaurant for every birthday, and whenever Patti got an unexpected bonus, which wasn’t very often. Newspapers and other agencies hired her sporadically, so her income had never been steady. We’d struggled during the years I attended private school, despite partial financial aid. I put my foot down after eighth grade, insisting on public school when I found a pile of late notices tucked between two cookbooks.
“Sounds good to me. I’ll pick you up after school. I hate to run, but I have to get some stuff done this morning, since we’ll be busy girls this afternoon!” She kissed my cheek with a loud smack. “You sure you’re feeling okay?”
“Yeah, I’m sure. Love you,” I said.
“Love you, too.” I watched her go inside with the cloud trailing close behind.
Birds were chattering to one another in a nearby tree, and the air smelled like wet grass. I pushed my hearing out to the birds, testing my ability. I concentrated, sending it in an invisible, pencil-thin line, then bubbling it around them. The birds sounded as if they were perched on my shoulder.
The heightening of my sense of smell and taste had come together the night of the fire, leaving a deadly flavor in my mouth. It had been like being stuck in a small, closed, unvented room with a smoking barbecue grill. I had no way of knowing I could control it at first. I’d thought I was dying or going insane.
Every year or so, the nightmare would return as a new sense blossomed. My head wanted to explode when my hearing enhanced. Hundreds of voices and sounds within a mile radius shouted like blaring televisions with no volume control. I couldn’t hear my own cries.
My enhanced vision, the fifth and final sense, welcomed me into my preteens. At least I could close my eyes with that one.
Mastering each sense had taken major practice, not to mention causing migraines, vomiting, and nosebleeds. Being able to hear and see and smell everything within a one-mile radius was major sensory overload. And unfortunately, perfect health did not make me immune to pain.
I’d been to the doctor only for annual checkups. Other than the migraines, I never got sick. Cuts and scrapes and bruises healed in a matter of hours, sometimes less. It wasn’t like on television, though, where a superhero’s gash closed and mended itself in seconds before your very eyes. I could watch it happening over the course of a couple of hours, like a flower tilting and opening to the morning sun, but who had time for that?
I missed a lot of school during those days. The only advantage of having no friends before ninth grade was having nobody to explain myself to. At least I had Patti. She’d fostered me as an infant, adopting me as soon as the states of California and Georgia would allow. I was old enough to call her “Pat-Pat” by that point.
I couldn’t hide the physical side effects of everything I went through, but Patti nurtured me through it all with no questions. She brushed my long hair with care when my sense of touch developed; it felt like each tangle would mangle my scalp forever. It hurt to move my arms because of the sensitive skin and muscle.
When a plague of migraines came and I couldn’t keep food down, Patti somehow got her hands on serious prescription-strength painkillers that would supposedly knock out a grown man and have him sleeping for hours. After the first one, I felt a blessed sense of drowsy relief for about twenty minutes, then the blistering pain broke through again. Patti was horrified when she found out I’d taken six in one afternoon. The label warnings said to take no more than two per day. After she took them away, I searched the house with a blind obsession all week, but never found them.
Each physical sense got easier to rein in as I gained focus. Eventually I was able to use my normal sensory levels at all times unless I chose to strengthen them, which might have been fun if there was someone to share it with. Only there wasn’t.
The hazy little clouds were everywhere, following people. Every person had one. I stared at them outright all day, which I’m sure made me seem even weirder than usual.
I watched Jay’s move around him as I switched books at my locker.
“What’s up, birthday girl?” he asked, glancing around himself. “Do I got a spitball on me or something?”
“No, nothing. Sorry.” I forced my eyes to his face. “I’m getting my license today.”