Connection (Le Garde) (10 page)

“
What are you guys talking about?” Ginger called from the living room.

“
Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked Mom. It didn’t matter that I just said it was crazy. I felt betrayed. I felt like she should have told me about this connection she had with Aaron’s father. I’d felt so alone and slightly psychotic the last year. Of course I loved it when Aaron and I were best friends, but after we fell out, I kept wondering,
Why me? Why do I have this disease?
Why do I have to have this connection to someone who just stopped caring about me?

“
What would I say, Anna?” Mom asked. “You said it, it sounds crazy.”

I backed away. “I can’t believe this.” I went to my room and pulled on my shoes. When I looked up, Mom stood in the doorway. “Please, Mom.
 
.
 
.”

“
Did you cause the power outage?” she asked.

I put my head in my hands, forcing myself to breathe steadily. “Could you do stuff like that, too?”

“
We could control water,” Mom said.

“
You.
 
.
 
.what?” I stared at her, my eyes wide.

“
We could conjure it out of thin air, make it move.” Mom shook her head, sighing. “That’s why I’m worried about the homework.”

The homework seemed so minuscule in comparison with everything else—like the
flow of electricity
I’d felt last night when Aaron and I joined hands. “Does Aaron know? About you and his dad?”

“
I don’t know,” Mom said. “I doubt it. Don’t you think he’d tell you something like that?”

“
You didn’t,” I said accusingly.

Mom sat down next to me on the bed. “I didn’t have a reason to tell you.”

I stood up. I knew it was stupid, but I couldn’t help my feelings. I felt like she did have a reason to tell me. Like she could have prevented so much. “I’m going to school early.” I grabbed a jacket out of the closet. “I’ll just take the bus.”

“
I can take you,” Mom said.

“
No, please,” I said, waving my hand.

“
Are you going to tell Aaron?”

I pulled my bag over my shoulder. I wanted to. I paused at the door and looked back at my mom. “Why?”

“
His dad might be upset. We.
 
.
 
.we promised not to tell anyone.”

“
Is that why you didn’t tell me?” I asked, my anger flaring.

“
I didn’t have a reason to tell you,” Mom repeated.

“
Well, I don’t know if I’m going to tell Aaron.” I backed into the hallway. “I’m getting off early today because it’s a half day. Can I get a ride with Steven?”

Mom hesitated. I thought she was going to say no, and I would have argued with her, but she nodded and said, “That’d be fine.”

I nodded and ran out of the house, ignoring Allie as she called after me.

7. des similarités (similarities)

Aaron

Friday morning. Only a few hours left until Spring Break. My dad actually said I could stay home. At first, I thought he was joking. I decided to go to school, though, for the chance of seeing Anna. I didn’t know if she’d try to avoid me all of Spring Break, even when we were both in San Francisco.

I pulled into a parking space and grabbed my stuff. I was about to get out of the car when I heard my phone buzzing. My screen lit up with Anna’s name, and I took a breath before answering, “Hello?”

“
Hey, Aaron,” Anna said. “Are you at school yet?”

“
Yeah, I just got here,” I said. Across the lot, I saw Jordan and Chandler walking for the doors.

“
I need to talk to you.” Her voice sounded unsteady. It was weird talking to her without being connected to her mind, knowing what she was thinking and feeling, not being able to speak French if I wanted to.

“
Is everything okay?”

“
Um, yeah, I guess. Wanna meet by the art building?”

I smiled. “The usual place?”

“
Yeah.”

A few minutes later, I walked to the back of the art building. There was a dumpster and a few feet away, a tall oak tree, and Anna and I used to meet in the space between them. It was kind of ruined when I found Anna and Jordan making out here, but I tried to push that image out of my head as I walked around the dumpster.

Anna was sitting against the oak tree. She saw me and smiled uneasily. Waves of anxiety were rolling off of her.

“
Morning,” I said, dropping on the ground next to her. “What’s up?”

Anna twirled one of her rings around her finger. “I.
 
.
 
.” she trailed off.

I didn’t say anything for a moment. I didn’t know whether to bring up last night, and if so, what to say. I leaned against the building, straightening my legs in front of me. The emotions coming off of her were almost making my stomach sick. What was she so wound up about? “So, about—”

“
My mom knows,” Anna said, meeting my eyes.

“
Knows what?” I already knew. I could tell from the significant look Anna gave me, from the way she felt. I stared at her, my mouth falling open. “Why would you tell her?”

“
I didn’t,” Anna said fiercely. “She guessed it. She knew because.
 
.
 
.because it happened to her. I mean, because she has that same connection with someone else.”

I sputtered for a moment. How could anyone else have been through this, and we hadn’t heard about it? How come her mom didn’t speak about it earlier? “What? Who?”

Anna studied her hands again, twirling her ring. “She—they both promised not to tell anyone. She didn’t want to tell me. She didn’t tell me last night, I had to get it out of her this morning.”

I tried to get a sense of what she was thinking. Maybe I could pick up who it was without her saying it. When I tried, though, I kept getting a sense of my dad. That couldn’t be right.

She looked me in the face. “It was your dad.”

“
What?” I stared at her again. There was no way.
 
.
 
.there was no way that could be right. No way. Dad? Dad and Anna’s mom? I thought about this morning when he told me I could stay home from school or last night when he stared at me after the concert like he knew or how he always asked if Anna was doing my homework for me. I shook my head. “No way.”

I thought of how Anna’s mom always seemed to avoid dinner at my house, even though her sisters had been over plenty of times. “I don’t understand,” I said.

“
I guess they met earlier than we thought,” Anna said quietly. “She said your mom was pregnant with Tara. She said.
 
.
 
.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “She said they could control water.”

I swore, getting to my feet and pacing around the small space. “Oh, my god. This is insane. Did they know about us this whole time?”

“
My mom didn’t know until last night,” Anna said. “She asked why I didn’t tell her.”

I scoffed and shook my head. “Why would you?”

“
I know.” Anna pulled her knees up to her chest. “I was kind of mad at first, that, I don’t know, she didn’t tell me earlier, but she didn’t have a reason to tell me, either. We all know how crazy it sounds.”

“
Holy shit. My dad and your mom?” I ran my hands through my hair. “And controlling water?” To think, we weren’t alone. We’d never been alone. I stopped pacing and stared up at the clear sky. “I wonder if there are others.”

“
Others?”

“
Others like us. Other.
 
.
 
.” I searched for a word, since ‘couple’ was too awkward. “Pairs. Other duos. Or, I don’t know, maybe we think it’s only two of us, but we’re really connected with other people we’ve never met.”

Anna looked kind of sick at that, and I agreed. One person was enough to worry about.

“
What about your sisters?” I asked.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Neither does my mom. It’s not something you can easily find out.”

“
Right.
 
.
 
.I wonder about Mitch and Tara. I guess it’s the same thing.
 
.
 
.what am I going to ask, ‘Have you ever felt someone’s emotions even though they’re not talking?’”

“‘
Do you know things around this someone that you wouldn’t normally know?’”

I smiled and bent down in front of Anna. “‘Can you do freaky stuff like cause power outages or control water?’”

Anna chuckled, and I sat down on the grass.

“
Wow,” I said. “I.
 
.
 
.I don’t know what to think about my dad.
 
.
 
.”

“
I don’t think you should tell him you know. My mom said they promised not to tell anyone.”

“
I wonder if my mom knows.” I had a feeling she didn’t. “So.
 
.
 
.I wonder if this, like.
 
.
 
.passes onto your kids. Or if it’s just a coincidence.”

“
I don’t know.” Anna shrugged. “It doesn’t seem like it has a method.”

“
Maybe it does and we just don’t know it.”

I heard voices from the other side of the dumpster and glanced up. Kaylie and Sam walked into view, and Sam saw us first. Her eyes widened, and she stopped in her tracks. “What are you guys doing back here?” she asked.

“
Just talking,” Anna said with a shrug.

A moment of awkward silence hung in the air.

“
Good job last night,” Kaylie said. “Your guys’ duet was really good.”

“
Oh, right,” Sam exclaimed. “All I heard about was the power outage. Crazy, huh?”

“
Yeah, it was,” I said. I looked at my watch. Four minutes to first period, and I had Chemistry, which was all the way across campus. I cleared my throat. “I should get to Chemistry.”

Anna nodded frantically and stood up. “Yeah, I have Composition.”

“
Hey, Aaron, I heard you’re going to San Francisco for Spring Break,” Sam said.

I slung my bag over my shoulder. “Uh, yeah. Are you guys going, too?” I knew Kaylie and Anna were, but I didn’t want to seem especially interested in Sam.

“
Yeah, we should totally hang out,” Sam said, beaming at me. She tucked a strand of blonde hair behind her ear. A couple months ago, I thought that was really cute.

“
Sure.” I glanced at Kaylie and Anna. “We should all go see a movie or something.” I backed away. “I’ll, uh, I’ll see you guys later.”

Anna smiled, waving at me. I turned away and walked to Chemistry, wondering about my dad, his secrets, Sam, and Spring Break.

Anna

“
Okay, what’s really going on with you and Aaron?”

I nearly poked my eye with my eyeliner pencil. I rubbed make-up out of my eye then looked at Sam’s reflection. We were at Steven’s aunt and uncle’s house getting ready for a night out. Steven’s cousin was a senior, and he’d invited us to a party at his friend’s house.

Sam was here just for a couple days because her cousin was getting married next Friday in Montana, and she was in the wedding party. Kaylie would be here all week, and I was glad for it because I didn’t want to be alone with Steven when his family left for the day. Well, I kind of did, but there was a bigger part of me that wasn’t ready for that. My mom
really
didn’t want me to be; she insisted I couldn’t go unless Kaylie did, and Kaylie’s parents let her do anything.

“
Well?” Sam asked. “I don’t want to be nosy, but it’s just, like, this seems to be coming out of nowhere.” She leaned forward toward the mirror and put some blush on her pale cheeks.

“
Aaron and I used to be best friends,” I told her. “We met at the Boys and Girls club when we were eight and we were.
 
.
 
.inseparable.”

Sam stared at me as I finished putting on my eyeliner. “Are you serious? I thought you were just, like, kind of old friends.”

“
Nope. In elementary school, it was me, him, and this kid named Tyler. Tyler moved to Colorado in eighth grade, and Aaron and I got other friends, like Kaylie or Jordan or Chandler, but we were still best friends.” I set down my make-up bag and double-checked my face. “Then last year.
 
.
 
.” I trailed off. Sam nodded for me to go on. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t told her everything before. I’d been intent on burying it in the past, but now I felt like she deserved to know.