Mikaela snorts. “Ethics? It’s a blog. And what about free speech? Plus, it’s just people’s initials. It could be anyone.”
“Come on, like people can’t guess,” I tell her. “And the URL was sent out to the whole school.”
Cody looks surprised for a second, then starts laughing. “I didn’t do that. But hey, I guess somebody thinks it’s of interest to the general public.”
Mikaela looks a little worried. “So the whole school knows now?” She smacks Cody on the top of the head.
“Ow! Fuck, what was that for?”
“Dumbass,” Mikaela says. “For putting me on there, that’s what it’s for. I don’t need two thousand people calling me ‘a valued member of the Psychic Friends Network.’” But she’s smiling a little, too. It’s hard to know whether she’s really even mad.
“You didn’t talk about me, did you?” I look at him coldly.
“I didn’t mention you by name, if that’s what you’re worried about,” he says. “Not even by initials. I said … let’s see … ‘Former JV swim hottie seen cavorting with men in black.’ And I didn’t say a thing about your power. I told you I wouldn’t tell anyone. I think it’s awesome, what you can do.”
Cody gives me a crooked smile. For a second, I almost believe him.
Then I come crashing down to earth again. He’s still trying to flatter me, still trying to convince me that he cares. Trying to downplay the fact that he’s using me.
But he doesn’t understand what it’s like to be able to do this. He doesn’t understand how much just the smallest amount of knowledge can hurt people.
“I mean it,” Cody says, still looking right at me. “You’re one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met.”
I look down, running one hand over the velvety, cream-colored surface of the couch cushion. I want to believe him. But his words make me feel sick.
“Sunny, just take a compliment, why don’t you?” Mikaela throws a pretzel at me.
“You know, you could really help people,” Cody says.
I remember the first time I ever told Mikaela about my underhearing, how she said it could be a real gift.
“I know,” I whisper. And I do. But.
“You could help me again.” His voice is low and urgent, his eyes intense. For a moment, it’s like Mikaela’s not even in the room, like it’s just the two of us.
There’s a twinge in my chest.
“It’s my parents, of course,” he says, answering a question I didn’t ask. “After what you found out, I asked them what was up. They said if I don’t do everything right this time … ” He trails off, picks up the remote control and turns it over and over in his hands. His face is set and angry. Suddenly, he draws his arm back and flings the remote across the room. It ricochets off the immaculate beige wall, chipping the paint, and falls to the floor. My whole body tenses up.
Mikaela just leans her head back against the couch and stares at the ceiling. “I can’t believe them,” she says. “They cannot send you to boarding school. That’s freakin’ ridiculous. What is this, the nineteenth century?”
Cody slumps back on the couch. Despite everything, I feel sorry for him.
“I hate asking this,” he says. “But you—I think you can do this.”
“Do what?” I look up at him from under my hair, suddenly nervous.
He pauses, glances at Mikaela, then looks back at me. “I was thinking that if your—uh, power—if it goes in one direction, maybe it goes in the other direction, right?”
I frown. “Like … what? Other people reading my thoughts?” I’m not sure what Cody is getting at. “They’re already reading my thoughts. You just published them on a web page for all the world to see.”
“Well,” he says, “I guess I mean—what I—I need you, Sunny.” His voice is pleading now. “I need you to … do something to my parents. Make them stop. I don’t want to get sent off. If I went to military school—fuck.” He swears some more, takes a long swig of his drink. “I can’t go to military school.”
“You would so get your cute little ass kicked,” Mikaela says, laughing.
“Whatever.” Cody slams the laptop shut and puts it on the floor. He looks back up at me. “You have to help. I don’t know what else to do. You could … push back. I don’t know.”
Push back? I feel like I’m made of lead, like I’m sinking into the couch, into the floor.
“It doesn’t work like that,” I say finally. “I want to help, but … it just won’t work.” I wouldn’t want to do it, wouldn’t want to force my thoughts on other people, even if I could.
“You haven’t tried it, though,” Mikaela says.
“I don’t have to try it.” My voice is taut and angry. They don’t understand. Every time my underhearing happens, I feel like I’m on the edge of a precipice, like I’m on the edge of losing myself.
I already lost Shiri. I won’t lose myself. I can’t.
“Why are you being so resistant?” Mikaela sits forward, leans around Cody to stare at me. “Don’t you at least want to find out if it’s possible? To influence someone?”
“No, I don’t,” I say. “Because it isn’t.” I start to get up.
“You of all people should know that anything is possible at this point,” Cody says, his eyes glinting. “I think you can do it. You learned to control it in the first place.”
It takes every ounce of self-control I have not to scream. I stand, stepping away from the pristine beige couch and the junk-food-covered coffee table.
“I can barely control it in one direction,” I say through clenched teeth. “What makes you think it even works any other way?” I fumble in my jeans pocket for my car keys.
“Wait,” Cody says. “You’re not even going to try? You could show me how to do it, if that makes you feel better.”
“It doesn’t matter. It isn’t right. You can’t just make people do what you want.” It’s absurd that he’s even considering it. And he’s using me to do it. He’s manipulating everyone.
“Oh, come on, Sunny,” Mikaela says, slumping against Cody and smirking at me.
I turn my back and walk out.
I sit in the car for a few minutes with the engine off. My forehead rests against the top of the steering wheel and I breathe deeply, the bridge of my nose throbbing with an impending headache.
My mind keeps circling the same set of thoughts, over and over. Elisa crying. The web page full of stupid gossip I was responsible for. Cody needing help; help that it’s not in my power to give. Anger at him, but also guilt at walking out when maybe I should have stayed and helped somehow. I should have at least stuck around long enough to commiserate, like Mikaela.
But even if I could have helped, it didn’t feel right. I don’t even know his parents. Unfair or not, whether they send him away to school is still their choice. It’s Cody’s responsibility to talk to them, not mine.
The headache pinches a little more. I take deep, slow breaths, picturing the flickering of the flame on my black-cherry candle, ocean waves creeping back and forth along the sand, the meditative feeling of swimming endless laps in the pool.
I’m only trying to relax enough to drive home. But without consciously meaning to do it, my mind is inexorably pulled back toward the house, back toward Cody. Suddenly I want to know, more than anything, what his issue really is. What can make a person so oblivious about everyone around him. Determined, I push harder.
I get vertigo, like I’m being tipped upside down. Then it gets weird.
At first, all I find is a maelstrom of swirling darkness. It surrounds me, buffeting me like a windstorm. Suddenly I’m in the center, floating, slowly tumbling in the eye of the storm, my ears ringing in the silence. That’s where I start to get a sensation of hiddenness, of the real Cody veiled beneath the chaos, protected by an ice-brittle surface layer. But there are cracks and melted spots in that icy surface, and I slip through.