Read Into the Deep for Free Online Page B

it.
     “How’d you do that?” the girl behind me asked.
     My jaw dropped open and I felt my voice wedge in my throat as if I were choking on my words. I raced for something to say. I looked to Timothy, who was cleaning his glasses again, and it hit me.
     I laughed nervously, “I um… I could see the reflection of the cards in his glasses.”
     “Oh!” the girl said and laughed. So did Tim. “I knew it had to be something. Geez, you had us all going.”
     “Yeah,” I said and looked around. Everyone appeared to buy my lie. The guys in front of us turned back around and so did Brant on the other side of me. Before he did, though, he gave me an odd look and I couldn’t help but think that he seemed skeptical of what I’d said. It was then that I noticed his partner, Jenny Richter, had glasses as well.
     We discussed our results for the rest of class. No one mentioned mine. Instead Mrs. Rochester pointed out that we all had on average a twenty percent success rating and thus none of us were clairvoyant. My success rating, of course, had been one hundred percent. We talked about different types of extra-sensory perception including telepathy, and Mrs. Rochester was quick to point out that she didn’t think any of these abilities were real. I, however, knew differently, having finally been convinced.
     The rest of that night I continued to hear people’s thoughts here and there. I began to realize that I couldn’t control it. It was easy to listen for the voices, but impossible to block them out. I didn’t know how, but it hadn’t started to bother me yet. Mostly what I heard were random snippets, like the pieces of conversation or lyrics you hear when flipping through radio stations. A girl complaining in her mind about having to run in gym class, a boy having an inner monologue about the way some girl’s boobs bounced as she ran. Most of it was trivial, some of it annoying. In study hall, I listened as someone kept repeating the chorus to Another One Bites the Dust .  Even in their head they sang off key and with terrible rhythm. At home I heard Mom listing off bills she had to pay in her mind and Sadie wondering if Dad would take her to the park that weekend. After dinner, I spent the rest of my night in my room. Sitting in there alone I heard no one and welcomed the quiet. I’d heard enough thoughts for one day.
     

 
     
 
     
5
     
Going Against the Current
     
O n Saturday I wore the blue dress. I didn’t care if Christy only thought it looked okay on me. I liked it. It was a dark royal blue, short with spaghetti straps. It was simple but it fit well. I had spent the earlier part of Saturday in my room avoiding the voices that I knew I’d hear if I went around my family. I called Tiana and helped her with her math homework then finished the rest of the reading I had for Lit. By eight, I was dressed and waiting for Christy to arrive. She had called around seven saying that she, Steve and Alex would be there in an hour to pick me up. I was nervous, not so much for being aroundthe boys and having Christy push Steve onto me as a potential love interest, but because I was unsure of what I would hear. Since coming downstairs I hadn’t heard a single voice, but I wasn’t optimistic enough to think that I wouldn’t hear any that night.
     A short while later, Alex’s Mercedes pulled up and I got in the back seat. It smelled of leather and cologne, thick and musty, like ginger and fresh cut wood. Steve was sitting in back with me and Christy was in the passenger seat. We were headed to the beach to have a small bonfire and watch the waves roll in. I was expecting a relaxing, fun night. I wouldn’t get one.
     “So, what do you like to do for fun?” Steve asked me on our way there.
     He, not so smoothly, reached his hand across the back of the seat behind my back. I wanted to roll my eyes, but was glad that it was only his outward cheesy