A Disease of Magic

Laser beams bored into Alex’s back as I glared at him while he walked ahead of me, sweeping the light side to side. Not literally, unfortunately, though a part of me wished I could develop a second ability just to better express my frustration without having to use words or be passive aggressive about it.

This was not what I had in mind when he said he had ideas how I could help prove my…dedication? Loyalty? Usefulness? Probably all of the above.

I wasn’t truly mad, but I was definitely irritated. Something about this felt strange to me, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Maybe it was because I was using my ability, essentially in public, to prove my worth?

“Remind me,” I said to Alex. He turned to face me, grinning despite my obvious annoyance. He was enjoying this way too much. “How is this helping?”

“We have a hard time getting people to help with stuff like this. Or, at least, people with a useful ability. They usually get promoted quickly, to have the clearance to do the big stuff, since their ability is needed.”

“Is that why you’re stuck at your level? Because your ability is kind of useless?” I grumbled.

Alex reached over and flicked my nose, unbothered. I swatted at his hand and missed. “Remind me next time to pick something that isn’t so early in the morning.”

“Or, bring my caffeine next time, like any sane human being,” I countered. “What kind of abilities get moved up quickly?”

Alex thought for a few moments. I wasn’t sure if he was thinking of an answer, or whether or not he should answer.

While I waited, I turned back to my task. It seemed to stupid. Ridiculous. But, unfortunately, I could kind of understand.

Alex was sweeping a black light across the sidewalk, focusing on cracks and crevices that might hide hidden gems.

Literally.

So far, we’d seen two, both of which I was easily able to retrieve with my ability. Our cover story, should anyone ask, was that I’d lost the stone to my engagement ring and was trying to find it with the help of my fiancé—Alex.

Alex had both gems—small, dirty, potentially worthless—in a bag in his pocket. Ideally, one or more would be an actual precious gem that could be appraised and sold to help fund the Organization. While there were ties to Hubert Industries, there was limited cash flow. This, Alex had assured me, would help fund some of the other projects on the waiting list. And that was what would get me noticed, my dedication to help the organization during my free time.

As long as these damn colored rocks were worth something.

To be able to find them with the black light, we’d had to come out here before the sun. The streets were mostly empty, a few cars quietly zipping past, a few other pedestrians walking. They mostly ignored us, though I’d caught a few curious glances when we bent down to peer into particularly deep cracks.

I’d be tempted to keep the gems for myself if I had any idea what I could use the money for. The first check from Farley Tech had dropped in my account last night, and at first I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me. It was thousands of dollars for a few days’ worth of, well, fucking around and playing with my ability. As it was, I had no idea what to use that money for. I didn’t owe rent, my bills would be paid off in no time, and I had no personal goals.

It was kind of depressing that my life revolved around my ability and its implications, to be honest.

Another thought occurred to me, and I asked, “Why didn’t you suggest that we, I don’t know, rob a bank or jewelry store or something instead?”

Alex stopped walking and gave my an exasperated look.

“Callie, we aren’t criminals,” he admonished.

I shrugged, the scarf wrapped around my neck limiting the movement to more of a strange twitch. “It’d be so much faster,” I added.

Alex rolled his eyes at me and refused to entertain my ridiculous question. But the train of thought continued, making me wonder how easy it would be to follow that path, to do illegal things just because those of us with abilities could do so easily.

We continued walking, Alex leading, as my thoughts continued to wander. By the time the sun had risen too much for the black light to be useful, I had created an entire hypothetical villain origin story in my head for a fictional character. It was quite impressive, tragic backstory included. Maybe I’d go home and type it out, just in case I wanted to do something with it one day. Morally gray villains—or even heroes—always felt real to me. Nothing was truly black and white.

Alex paused outside of my apartment building, and I drew to a stop.

“You coming up? I can make us some coffee, which I should have already had by now,” I joked, though my offer was genuine.

Alex shook his head. “I have things to do. I want to drop these two stones off before work.”

It still seemed like an abso-fucking-lutely stupid task to prove my worth, like a side quest in a game when all I wanted was to focus on the main quest. But if Alex said it would help, to boost my standing, then I was willing to give it a try. Once. After this, I would wait and see what effect it had, if any, before agreeing to more.

It was lucky that Alex could take the two little maybe-gems in for me so I didn’t have to show my face yet. I was a little trepidatious and was secretly hoping Alex would agree to go with me the next time I had to go there. I was too tired and under-caffeinated to go with him right now, so I’d let him do the honors before work.

The corners of my mouth turned down. “You’re working today?” I tried remembering what his schedule was. My days were still blurred, my time being held against my will for my own protection having thrown me off my routine. If I remembered correctly, which was a big if, then he shouldn’t be working today. It would be the second of his days off, unless work meant something with The Organization.

“Technically, no, but there’s meetings that I don’t want to miss.”

“That’s a bummer. You getting paid?”

“It’s not my day job,” he confirmed with a wink. “So, no, but still important.”

We said our goodbyes, Alex’s strong arms wrapping around me tightly and giving me a little squeeze that was comforting, making me feel safe. It was a feeling I wasn’t used to, and I wasn’t sure what that meant.

When he went to pull away, I grabbed his hand and held it tight between mine.

“Hey,” I said quietly. It wasn’t like there was anyone around at the moment who could overhear us, but it felt like this was a private moment, one that was shared in whispers. “Thank you. For helping me with all of this, even though I was bitchy earlier. And I know—” I held up a hand when he opened his mouth to stop his interruption “—that I said the same thing last night when you left. But it means a lot to me that you gave me the chance to explain everything. Part of the reason why Leo and I aren’t getting along is because he didn’t listen to me. And I just…”

I ended with another awkward shrug, not sure how to finish that statement. I just, what? I just appreciated Alex being a considerate person? I just am glad he took the time to listen, didn’t keep me in the dark and shared valuable information with me even though he had no reason to trust me? There were a lot of ways to end that sentence, but none could accurately convey the warm, fuzzy feeling blooming in my chest as I looked up and met Alex’s warm eyes.

He reached forward, tucking a strand of hair behind my ear, letting his hand linger and trail along my jaw before it fell back to his side.

“What are your plans tonight?” he asked, leaning in close and ducking his head a bit. It gave me the illusion of privacy, and I felt my heart kick up a beat or two.

“I…” I had to wrangle my thoughts back into coherence, because suddenly all they wanted was to drag this man upstairs and spend the entire day with him. Without me noticing, he had slowly started to become my safe space, and I wanted more of that.

Was it because Leo had betrayed my trust, and I was looking for someone else to fill that best friend role?

Maybe.

Would it be okay if Alex was the one to—

My phone vibrated in my pocket, dragging me back to the present where my boyfriend was watching my thoughts spiral in amusement.

Alex chuckled and leaned the rest of the way to kiss my nose. “Let me know how your day goes. If you’re awake enough, I’d like to take you out on a date. But we can always pick another day, of have a night in. Let me know.”

I nodded mutely as he gave my hand, which I was still holding, a squeeze and turned away.

After a moment of standing there, feeling a bit lovestruck, I took my phone out of my pocket and read the message that had come through.

Unknown: Hey Callie! Are you free to meet for lunch or something? (It’s Amelia, btw)

She looked like a whole new person, one I didn’t recognize at first until she waved at me across the little taco place she had suggested.

The bags under her eyes were gone. Her hair was brushed and braided, showing off pink cheeks and a bright smile.

She looked healthy.

It nearly brought tears to my eyes to see the stark difference in her just from less than two weeks’ recovery.

She stood as I arrived at her table, and she all but strangled me with the force of her hug.

“Amelia,” I managed to get out. “You look good. How are you feeling?”

She pulled away, still beaming at me.

“Great.” She tucked some of her blond hair behind her ear. Her voice dropped and she added, “Thank you. Truly. Dr. Goodwin says you may have saved my life.”

It was my turn for pink cheeks from the compliment.

“I’m not sure about that,” I hedged. “But I am sure that I’m glad to see you. How have things been? How are you adjusting?”

Her ability, telepathy, was one that intrigued me to no end. To know what a person was thinking, at any point, could be so useful but also overwhelming.

“I’m good,” she promised. “I have these pills that I can take when…thing get to be too much, and it dampens them.”

That was…curious.

“What do you mean?”

Amelia took out her phone, scanning the code for the restaurant’s menu and ordering system. I copied her, and began putting together what tacos I wanted.

“Sometimes, I can’t stop it. And so the pills help dampen it until I can get control again.”

“So is it…?” I didn’t want to say it out loud, even though the low buzz of other conversation would drown out my question.

It took her a few seconds to catch on. “Oh! The ability? Yeah, it is. It’s…interesting. Like, I spent some time with Dr. Goodwin at the beginning, you know? Something like this is apparently a big deal, and he wanted to make sure that I could control it and all that.” She waved a hand in the air dismissively. “That one friend of yours, Alex, stopped by a couple of times. He had some…interesting thoughts.”

“Are you sure it was my Alex?” It felt weird calling hime mine, even though he technically was. Could this be another thing that Leo had ruined? Calling me his best friend, and doing that?

Ugh. My therapy appointment could not come soon enough.

“On the taller side, messy brown hair, blueish eyes?”

“Sounds like him.”

Amelia submitted her order and placed her phone face-down on the table. I was still building my third taco.

“Your name frequently came up in his thoughts,” she informed me. “He was worried about you.”

Thinking back to the timeline of when Amelia would have been visited by Alex, it probably matched with me disappearing on him.

“Oh, yeah, I’m obviously fine,” I promised Amelia.

My bio-screen buzzed slightly, alerting me to gamma exposure. Was…was Amelia reading my thoughts now?

“Sorry!” she apologized quickly. “Sometimes when I’m curious about something, it just sort of happens. But how do you know when I’m doing it?”

I submitted my own taco order and mimicked her phone placement. I set my left arm on the table, turning on the bio-screen to show her some things.

“I have one of these,” I said needlessly. Obviously, she had eyes. “And a…friend of mine, who works for the company, made some changes because we both developed abilities, like yours. His is telekinesis. Mine’s teleportation.”

“Ooh, that’s so cool!”

“Um, so is yours,” I said honestly. To be able to get more information without having to pry it out of people? Now that would be useful.

Amelia cocked her head, he braid swinging to one side. “What aren’t people telling you?”

Fuck, I wanted to trust this girl. My gut was telling me to, but I barely knew her. Lord knows I needed a friend, someone to share this with, someone to just have a normal conversation with, too. Boy talk. Sleepovers. Whatever else was normal for girlfriends to do together. I didn’t even know.

Quietly, almost under her breath, Amelia said, “I would love to be your friend.”

“Shit, sorry Amelia,” I apologized. “My thoughts got away from me. I…”

“No, it’s okay. I get your hesitation, truly. But I think if you give me a chance, you’ll see that you can trust me. I…also don’t have many friends. Not any close ones, anyways. And this…new change sets me apart from them. And I can’t tell them why I’m suddenly better. I think they’re worried that I’m going to get worse again. They’ll get hurt.”

I reached across the table and grabbed her hand, squeezing it.

“Let’s be friends. We can work on everything else. But it is definitely nice that we don’t have to hide what we can do from each other.”

She twisted her wrist and took my hand, squeezing it back. I could see her eyes water a bit. Maybe this meant as much to her as it did to me.

“To answer your question,” I said, redirecting my thoughts before either one of us turned into a blubbering mess, “I don’t know exactly what people aren’t telling me. I don’t know what I don’t know, if that makes sense? But I’m trying to get answers, and it’s not going well.”

Amelia nodded, withdrawing her hand.

“Would you like help?”

I considered that for half a second before deciding that I didn’t want to drag her into this. “No, that’s okay. Thanks for the offer, though. I don’t even know where we would start.”

“You don’t want to get me involved.” She looked puzzled, trying to figure out the meaning behind my thoughts. I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes. This girl could become a menace if she wanted to. Knowledge was power, and suddenly she could know a lot of things in a very short amount other than time.

“No, I don’t. This isn’t something you need to worry about. It’s my problem that I’ll figure out eventually.”

She pursued her full lips at me. “I’ll let it go for now. But since you’re my friend, I should warn you that I’m going to bring it up again.”

She was tenacious. I admired that.

Amelia smiled at my thoughts as my bio-screen buzzed again.

“Maybe,” I relented, “I’ll introduce you to my neighbor, and we’ll see what happens.”

Her blue eyes lit up with excitement. “Oh, yeah? Who’s your neighbor?”

“The ex-best friend.”

“Ooh, why are you no longer friends?”

I leaned back in my chair and scoffed. “That’s a long answer.”

She gestured to the empty table between us that was still taco-less.

Sighing, I leaned forward and rested my elbows on the table so I could lower my voice.

“Well, he betrayed my trust, withheld information from me, kissed me without permission when I have a boyfriend, is misogynistic, and an overall control freak.”

Amelia’s eyebrows shot up. “Wow. Okay, going to be honest, that’s an impressive list of offenses.”

“Right? It’s amazing one person could fuck up so bad.”

“Can we circle back to one particular offense?”

“Sure.”

“I know there are probably more important ones than this. But he kissed you when you have a boyfriend?”

“Mhmm. I should have slapped him.”

“What did you do?”

“Well, I kind of freaked out and teleported myself away from him for the first time.”

“Woah. Okay, that’s pretty cool. What’s your range on that?”

Before I could answer, someone appeared with our taco orders. They smelled delicious, and the white queso and chips I’d added to my order looked divine. I moved it between us to share with her.

“You’ll need to keep your calories up,” I said. “That’s one thing I wasn’t prepared for.”

“The constant eating?”

“Yep. It’s great that I can eat whatever I want without consequence, but also annoying at the same time. Although, I’m supposed to get my very own personal chef to make my meals for me so I get the right balance of stuff.”

Amelia swallowed a bite of her taco. “Really?”

“Yeah, it’s part of the contract I have.”

“Um, where are you employed, and are they hiring?”

I laughed, which felt nice. “It’s the ex-best friend’s dad’s company. I kind of got strong-armed into working there. I would not recommend it if you have another option. I’d go Hubert Industries first, if I were you.”

Amelia considered me, those blue eyes of hers seeing more than what was written on my face. “There’s a lot more to that, isn’t there?”

I took a bite of my first taco to buy myself some time, the spicy chicken making my taste buds dance happily.

Once I swallowed, I answered with a sighed, “Yeah.”

Amelia nodded understandingly. “Do you want to talk about it?”

I looked around, noting the other customers seated nearby. It wasn’t busy, but it certainly wasn’t private.

“I’d rather not talk about it here. Want to come over to my place after we’re done?”

Her eyes lit up with excitement. “Yes!”