Until slowly, imperceptibly, Shiri changed.
I don’t know what to say. I stand there uncomfortably, shifting from foot to foot, wishing I hadn’t asked about the bruise. It seems far-fetched that one of the fish would have just fallen off the wall, but I have no reason not to believe her. It’s hard to believe Uncle Randall could have hurt her. Except … I’ve never heard her angry like this. And after Thanksgiving, I can’t help wondering.
I still haven’t deliberately tried to use my underhearing. But I feel terrible for her, and maybe if I find out what happened, I can help.
It’s frightening—frightening enough to make my hands tremble and my armpits sweat—but I close my eyes and still my mind. I take my confusion and worry and terror and try to channel them into a tiny boiling point in the middle of all the stillness, like a laser of emotion that can cut through the layers and let out Auntie Mina’s secret anger and fear.
But somehow—maybe because I’m trying so hard, digging my fingernails into my palms and squeezing my eyes shut—somehow it just doesn’t work. Nothing happens. It’s only me inside my head. Auntie Mina is still out there, still standing at the sink rinsing dishes with an unhappy frown on her face.
Maybe I can’t figure this out after all. The anxiety feels like a hand clutching at my intestines as I stand there, powerless. I slowly, carefully start to carry out cups of tea on a tray, composing my face into a smiling mask.
At lunchtime the next day, I pull Mikaela away from the group, hustling her around the corner from the picnic table where Cody and everyone else is gathered. We sit side-by-side against the wall and, once again, I tell her about everything. The embarrassing Shirley Temple. The scrapbook. The underhearing and my strange conversation with Auntie Mina. I even tell her about my growing suspicions that Shiri might have had some kind of ability too.
“Man.” Mikaela makes idle marks on the back of her hand with a blue ballpoint pen—a teacher saw her black marker and confiscated it. Now she’s drawing angry little blue faces over and over. “That is really intense. I’m glad I wasn’t there. But … ”
“What?” I say, after she’s quiet for a minute.
“I keep thinking about how you said you tried to listen to your aunt. ‘Underhear.’ Whatever. And nothing happened?” She peers at me sidelong, her expression unreadable.
“I wanted to,” I say miserably. “I wanted to help her somehow. But I couldn’t do anything. I tried so hard, Mikaela!”
“If you actually could have seen into her thoughts,” she says, “maybe it would just be something you didn’t want to know.” She looks down again. It’s a good point, but today, she sounds like she’s not sure if she believes me. Not that I blame her.
I feel a stab of intense loneliness. Shiri might have understood, at least if her journal entries are anything to go by, but journal entries are a poor substitute for the real thing.
Mikaela gets up, gives my ponytail a tug, and walks back to the picnic table. I spend a minute composing myself before I stroll back to rejoin the group. When I arrive, Mikaela is saying something to Cody with an impish smile, giving his cheek an affectionate, granny-like pinch. Then she heads to the other side of the table to chat with Becca.
Cody looks up at me intently. I feel warmth flood my cheeks and travel down to my stomach. I’ve tried to be aloof, but my physical reaction to him catches me off guard.
“Hey, Cody,” I say, trying to sound casual.
“Hey. Did you see what Mik did to me? So uncalled-for.” He rubs his cheek. I try not to smile, but I can’t seem to help it.
“At least she didn’t try to give you a makeover this time.”
“Like you forcing your Banana Republic hat on me. Again, uncalled-for,” he says, grinning for a second. “At least I relieved you of that nasty piece of bland, sweatshop-produced, corporate … clone-itude.”
“Yeah, I got rid of all the rest of that stuff, too,” I lie—I shoved it all into the back of my closet, including the hat, which he eventually gave back to me. I gesture vaguely at what I’m wearing today: black jeans and a burgundy T-shirt I got from Thumbscrew printed with a Brian Froud painting of evil-looking fairies. My hair, now dark brown again, hangs down in two sleek braids on either side of my head.
He’ll have to say something. I don’t look like the old me at all.
But Cody just smiles a little and turns abruptly to Andy, saying exactly nothing else to me. I’m surprised at how disappointed I am, but I try not to let on. I just grab my lunch out of my backpack and sit down as if nothing happened, as if I hadn’t said anything to him or expected him to respond. But my cheeks burn.
From Shiri Langford’s journal, April 13th
Friday the 13th! Lucky me. Because of course THAT happened again. It always seems to come when I least expect it, when I’m thinking about something else or nothing at all. It made me angry this time because I was with Brendan and spaced out in the middle of our date. What I heard—it seemed like he was irritated, but I couldn’t be sure if he was annoyed with me or someone else. I was so scared he was angry at me, but I couldn’t figure out why, and although I kept trying and trying, I couldn’t hear anything else.
I just wish I could understand why it happens. And why me.
I was little, maybe nine, the first time it happened. My brother was home visiting from college. He told me he’d brought me a present, but it was up in the oak tree in the backyard. I climbed up there—higher, he said—and then suddenly I was so high I was too scared to climb back down. I clung to the trunk as tightly as I could and screamed, but he just thought I was joking. He must have been drunk or on something, because he just laughed and laughed. I stopped panicking and clenched my teeth, trying to steady myself enough to figure out how to get down, and that was when I heard it.
Not out loud. Not anywhere but in my head.
“Stupid kid.”
ten
“Okay,” says Mikaela, facing me cross-legged on my bedroom floor. “Let’s try it without the candle this time.”
I open my eyes, sigh, and blow out the tiny flame. My right foot is falling asleep. I flex it a few times and rearrange my legs into a more comfortable position.
“We’ve been trying for half an hour,” I say. “I think it’s hopeless.”
“Come on. One more time, for shits and giggles.” Mi-kaela smiles at me coaxingly.
“Fine,” I say, and sigh again. Just once more. I close my eyes.
“Relax, and clear your mind,” she says in a smooth, drawn-out voice. She sounds like an easy-listening radio DJ or my mom when she’s leading weekend yoga. Somehow, I suppress a snort of laughter. “Focus on your breathing … in … and out … ”
I keep the sound of Mikaela’s voice in the back of my mind as I inhale and exhale as calmly as possible. I hear a bird trill suddenly, flying past the window, and my parents moving around downstairs. I can even smell remnants of the candle smoke. The carpet fibers are making my ankles itch. I’m extra-aware of my five senses. But it’s not those senses that I’m trying to tap into.
“Okay. Now, remember your Uncle Randall and how angry you are at him,” Mikaela says, in a flat and hard tone. “How sexist he is, how insensitive.”
My nostrils flare and my breathing quickens.
“He never understood Shiri. He probably makes your Auntie Mina cry. Poor Auntie Mina.”
I inhale sharply, thinking of Auntie Mina, of her bruised shoulder and her bruised feelings. I’m angry, but mostly I just feel sorry for Auntie Mina, and sad.