

BROKEN TIES

Prequel Novella

The Mentalist Series

Kenechi Udogu

Copyright © 2014 Kenechi Udogu

All rights reserved.

Smashwords Edition

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locale is entirely coincidental.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Other books by Kenechi Udogu

The Other Slipper

The Summer of Brian

The Altercation of Vira

The Yam Po Club

Aversion: Book One of The Mentalist Series

Sentient: Book Two of The Mentalist Series

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I'm wrapping a warm bubble of gratitude around Neso, Okey, Mum, Chizoba, Pi-lin, Donna, Dumebi, Triona, and my new beta readers – Lisa Catanese and Chelsea Hunter. Your unwavering devotion to this series will never be forgotten.

This book was written for the fans of The Mentalist Series. Thank you for reminding me to share Paul's story with you.

ONE

Paul

Have you ever felt trapped by your own existence? Knowing nothing you do or say can change your messed up situation? Yet, knowing the change you desire will only lead to pain and loss. It's a far more unpleasant sensation than I've described; and once the feeling sets in, it's pretty difficult to shake.

I'm not usually this dramatic.

Scratch that.

I'm never dramatic. The truth is, I can't afford to be theatrical about life with the fate I've been allotted. But, sometimes, finicky emotions sneak up on you and a guy can't keep his head up like he knows he should.

Like the first day I caught a glimpse of my future. I was six years old when my father had the grossly uncomfortable conversation about the birds and the bees with me. Probably a bit young for such graphic talk, but when you're not like regular folk, some things had to be broached earlier than others. That way I wouldn't get the option of dreaming about a life that could never be.

After my initial dismay at the thought of never marrying my seven year old freckled neighbour, Susan Riley, things swung into full gear with my training. In the ten years which followed that eye-opening conversation, I tried not to look back on what could have been (it helped that Susan moved on to some other guy once I began ignoring her), or to look ahead at what I'd be missing out on.

That was the more difficult feat. Who wants to live life knowing every detail has already been planned out for you? Living in a large city, I noticed pretty girls all the time (it was impossible not to); but with my father drilling tenets of look-but-don't-touch into me for years, I got by okay.

Sort of.

Like I said before, it wasn't an easy task.

I remember the moment when I started thinking of my life like it was a load I was dragging towards a dead-end. One which I'd hit in five years when I'd turn twenty-one and have to take on my real responsibilities. I wasn't afraid of what was to come. Having a child with a stranger to keep a bloodline intact isn't an uncommon practice. Royalty has done it for centuries and no one seems to balk at the idea, so there was really nothing odd about our kind trying to preserve our heritage.

There was nothing unusual about the night everything changed. No flashing lights in the sky, no searing fire in my belly; no sign whatsoever to suggest the shift which was to come. It was late May, summer beckoned and the sky was light, despite the lateness of the evening. I'd just finished a long shift unloading deliveries at a local supermarket. Crate lifting wasn't fun but it beat the alternative, tagging along with Dad on his handyman job for half the pay. It wasn't that I didn't like spending time with my father; I just wasn't as good with tools as he was.

On my way home I always stopped off to clear my head at the back steps of an old court building the city council had shut down a few years ago. Three hours of walking down packed aisles was almost as bad as a full day at school. I'd had a fairly good day because nobody had needed any special attention from me. I didn't particularly mind what I had to do with my abilities; I just wasn't always in the mood to carry out my duty when I was exhausted and irritable at work.

Taking a long drag on one of the cigarettes I'd pilfered from Dad's stash, I watched as the evening breeze reduced the grey wisps of smoke I'd exhaled into nothing. One second, smoke, next thing, gone. Despite a long term acceptance of my fate, I occasionally allowed myself the vain thought that one day I could fade into nothingness too. Just float up and be carried away with the wind. Maybe I'd not dissipate like the smoke; instead I'd be deposited in a place where none of this mattered. A place far away from my reality, a place with no one to save from themselves.

That might be the only way to escape what I was. What I had to do.

"How many times do I have to say this, Brandon? I'm not interested in spending an entire evening with you. Or any time of the day for that matter."

"Come on Nora, you can't be serious. I've seen how you look at me when I'm out on the field."

The voices came from behind some overgrown shrubs and I sat up, crushing the cigarette butt with my heel, ready to bolt if they headed my way. I chose that spot as my refuge stoop because people rarely walked past it; the path which ran round the back of the building only led to Oswald Close. You'd have to be one of its few residents to use it.

"It's called watching the game, you idiot. I'm looking at everyone out there, not just you. Get over yourself."

"Nora..."

"Besides, it doesn't matter what you want because I'm seeing someone else."

Silence.

"Yeah, right," the guy scoffed.

By then I knew whose conversation I was unwittingly eavesdropping on and I wished I was anywhere but there. There was still a chance I could slip away before they came into view. Rising as quietly as I could, I tiptoed down the steps and began my escape.

I must have misjudged their proximity because I had barely taken two steps when Nora came into view. She stopped walking when she saw me, taking a step back as she was clearly not expecting anyone to be lurking there. A shadow passed over her face but it was quickly replaced with a smile, probably because she recognised me from our Physics class. Better a weirdo student than a masked man with a knife, right?

"Hey, Paul," she sauntered up to me and placed her hand lightly on my arm, her smile broadening. Her pale blue sun dress fluttered in the breeze I'd been fixated on a minute ago.

Why was she acting like there was nothing strange about the fact I'd been sitting there alone? Wait, what was I saying? Why the hell was she touching me? Acting like we were old friends.

"Walk me home," she reached up to whisper close to my ear. In the process her body pressed up against mine, her warm breath tickled my cheek. A faint strawberry scent filled the air around me.

I felt myself shudder.

"Huh?"

I was failing in my quest not to sound completely moronic.

"Not all the way, just enough to put Brandon off. I only live around the corner."

Her eyes pleaded with me almost as eagerly as her voice. How could I say no to that?

"Okay," I heard myself whisper back. It was only around the corner, right? No harm done, especially if she really didn't want to be followed.

I looked up to meet the eyes of the now gaping Brandon. It probably looked like Nora and I were having an intimate conversation. I wondered if he thought I was the person she'd just said she was dating. That would certainly explain the look on his face.

The thing was, I knew Nora was lying about having a boyfriend. I always know when people aren't being truthful. One of the gifts I get for being special ol' me.

"You've got to be kidding me," Brandon growled.

Despite the accuracy of his observation, his words still stung.

"See you tomorrow," Nora turned to dismiss him with a playful wave, her body remained close to mine. Yep, no doubt about it, she wanted him to think we were together.

Perhaps Brandon Collier, a.k.a. golden boy footballer, was not one to take rejection lightly, or his brain just couldn't accept the connection his eyes were forced to look upon. Whatever the reason was, instead of backing off like he should have, he moved towards us, grabbed Nora's arm and twisted her towards him.

I'm pretty sure it was her wince that made me flip.

Wrenching his hand off hers, I wrung it tightly against his back, pushing him off in the process. I might not have had the benefit of daily athletic training, but hours of lifting heavy boxes over the last few months had done wonders for my usually non-existent biceps. Also, standing over six feet tall, I had a good height advantage.

Brandon wasn't prepared for my reaction and he stumbled as I shoved him up against a wall, holding his head in place to make sure I had eye contact.

Don't ever dare think of laying a finger on Nora again. This is the last time you will bother her. Ever! You will forget I'm the one who said these words to you once I let go.

I hadn't spoken the words out loud but I knew Brandon heard me when a blue light flashed in his grey eyes. I knew it would be safe to let go then but, for show, I added out loud, "Quit being a dick, Brandon," before pushing him away.

For a second I wasn't sure if my mind jig had worked as he stared blankly at us for a little too long. But he stepped back, nearly tripping over himself, and then blinked rapidly before turning and walking away.

"Wow, thanks. I really didn't want him following me home. I thought he got the message a few blocks back, but some guys suck at reading body language," Nora sighed as we watched Brandon disappear behind the hedge. "That was pretty impressive by the way. Who knew Brandon was afraid of Paul Colt, eh? People would have paid good money to see that."

I bet they'd have paid even more money to know what I really did to him.

"He's gone now," I added a little inanely. What did boys like me say to girls like Nora in situations like this? Probably nothing; this kind of scenario almost certainly never arose.

Her brows lifted as she glanced at me then down the path that led home. It still wasn't dark but I guessed what she was going to say before the words came out. "You aren't going to let a girl walk home alone, are you?" For good measure, she tilted her head to one side and batted her lashes at me.

What was she playing at?

"You don't even know me."

"Sure I do. Age old lover of Marlboro Lights and The Red Hot Chilli Peppers," she answered, pointing at my T-shirt. "And I know you know who I am."

That last bit was said without a hint of cockiness. Everyone at school knew who she was. Nora Brice. She ran track and won practically every single race she'd been in. Plus, she was breathtakingly beautiful, yet refused to date any of the scores of guys who asked her out. Having Brandon hound her was probably just an average day's bother for her.

I know describing someone as breathtakingly beautiful sounds a bit much, but that's simply what she was. Long lashes framed dark wide eyes, her full lips sat perfectly below her slightly rounded nose and her skin always had a soft bronzed sheen to it. I found out later on that she got this from her mother's Creole heritage. Even the faint scar that ran along her right jaw was endearing; almost like it wanted to prove her beauty could shine through what others might have called an imperfection.

And her hair.

Oh, that hair.

It could break a heart or two all by itself. Shoulder length, auburn, thick, glossy, not quite straight, not quite wavy. I'd always wondered if she spent a long time in front of the mirror to get it looking that way. I'd also always wondered if it would feel as soft to the touch as it looked. She was standing so close to me that I could have crossed that one off my list, but I kept my hands to my sides and tried to focus on what she'd just said.

It's fair to say I had a thing for Nora Brice.

"So?"

"So what?" I snapped out of my Nora-bubble.

"Walk me home? It's only about a minute away but Brandon might come back and I don't want to have to deal with him. Come on, help a girl out."

Well I wasn't going to say no, was I? Whatever her plan was, I would kick myself for days if I passed on this opportunity to spend another few minutes with her. I racked my brain for reasons why she'd want to extend my presence in her company. A thank you for services rendered? Or was she really afraid of walking down the not too scary path alone? My gut remained calm so I knew she meant what she said. So, why come this way in the first place?

Nodding, I gestured for her to lead the way. Her smile melted whatever reservations I'd had and we fell into step beside each other. Funnily enough, that was the highlight of the next five minutes. We walked in silence, breaking out on to Oswald Close, until she stopped outside an old block of flats. It looked pretty swanky to me, with chandeliers in the lobby, a porter's desk and tiled flooring.

"I can take it from here," Nora announced with mock bravado and then laughed when I frowned at her. "I'll see you at school tomorrow?"

"Sure, whatever," I replied, knowing she didn't really mean she'd talk to me at school. She would just see me at Physics class and smile like she always did to everyone. Maybe I'd even graduate to receiving a wave.

I watched as she got buzzed in by the porter and headed to the bay of lifts. I hoped she'd turn around for one last glance, but she didn't. My disappointment followed me all the way home.

It was only when I stepped into my empty flat, a few blocks away, that I realised I'd walked Nora home and hadn't puked or passed out. Most importantly, I'd ignored one of the rules my father had told me never to break. I'd altered someone's mind for personal gain. Well, not my personal gain per se, but I hadn't used my abilities in the way I was supposed to.

Why the hell didn't I care?

Oh yeah, because I'd done it for Nora Brice.
TWO

Nora

"Wow, Mr Colt in a collared shirt. I almost didn't recognise you without a band name sprawled across your chest."

The expression on Paul's face, when he looked up to find me leaning against the baked goods shelf he'd been stacking, was priceless. Definitely one to capture if I'd had a camera on me. Shame I'd only have my mind's eye to look back on; he was incredibly cute when he was confused. Way cuter than normal, and I'd thought that was impossible to beat.

"What are you doing here?" he demanded, abandoning the box of sliced bread he'd been unloading and approaching me. His olive green eyes darted around like he thought he'd get in trouble for talking to me.

"Relax, I'm not stalking you. It's a supermarket; people come in here to buy things they need." I brandished the packet of dental floss I'd grabbed a minute ago, just in case that exact question was fired at me.

"Oh, sorry I didn't mean..."

"Don't worry, if I wanted to stalk you, you'd never know," I flashed what I hoped was a flirty smile at him.

Please don't think I'm a nut job, I prayed silently.

Seriously, no one would have blamed him if he did. After somewhat randomly hijacking him last night, I'd gone ahead and ignored him all day at school. And not the usual oh-I-didn't-see-you-there ignoring, more like total blanking. When I saw him sitting with his rock band T-shirt friend at lunchtime, laughing at a joke the other boy must have cracked, I'd stopped myself from waving when he looked up and caught my eye. Actually, I'd panicked and glanced away, sharpish.

I know it sounds a little daft but it was all meant to be part of my grand plan. If you really want a guy to take notice of you, you reel him in and then push him away, blow hot and cold, that sort of thing. I'd read it in a magazine a few years ago; they even had success stats listed at the bottom of the article.

Truth is, I'd resorted to magazine advice because I had no idea how to deal with the Paul situation I was stuck in. It'd taken me a while but I'd finally come to accept that I didn't just like the guy; I liked him liked him. You know what I mean?

At first the whole thing was just a mild irritation I thought would eventually pass, but it was kind of difficult to fight my own body when it went a bit mental and did really odd things whenever he was in the vicinity. Like, I always felt pukey when his tall frame appeared at a doorway, or when I caught sight of the back of his dark hair in the hallway. No idea why because his buzz cut wasn't particularly attractive, and he was probably too tall for me to kiss without tiptoeing. Not that I'd thought of kissing him.

Not much anyway.

And when he smiled...hmmm; let's just say I'm glad he didn't do it a lot because I'd never have been able to make it through any Physics class. Or lunch break. I always thought dimples were only cute on babies, yet he broke that theory every single time his lips turned upwards. He was the first guy who made me want to jump on a desk and declare my smothering feelings to the world, like some crazy chick in one of those soppy teen 80s movies.

Lame arse feelings!

"Can I help you with anything?" Paul adopted a customer care tone, folding his arms across his slender chest. How the heck had he handled Brandon's bulk last night with such regular looking biceps? Sure, they were a little defined but Brandon was a big boy.

"Nah, I just came to get this but I saw you and thought I'd say hello."

The lie flowed from my lips but I didn't blink.

Paul's left brow arched like he was about to refute my words, but something stopped him.

"Hello to you too," he nodded and began to turn away.

Wait, why was he smiling like he knew exactly why I was standing there? And why was he turning away? The magazine tips weren't working. He was supposed to engage me in conversation which would lead to coffee or something. For a brief second I considered the heart-breaking possibility that he didn't like me. But I knew that couldn't be true. He was affected by me. When I'd pushed up against him last night, I'd felt his heart pounding away like crazy; almost like he was afraid to be standing that close to me.

"But if you want to...you know...hang out when you're done here, I can...wait?"

What the heck was I doing? I was going to wait for him to get off work? I'd just thrown my whole hot-and-cold plan out the window. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

He stopped and turned around, a frown knitting his brows.

Please say yes, please say yes.

Who knows what was running through his mind. He probably thought I was crazy but, for some desperately frustrating reason, I was still hopeful. If not I would have tossed the floss I held and walked away like I should have. Seriously, what was wrong with me?

He hesitated for what felt like a full minute, but must only have been seconds, before shrugging and nodding. "Sure. I get off work in an hour if that's not too long for you to wait. But I can only hang out for half an hour. School night and all."

Thank you sweet Lord!

"Cool," I attempted nonchalance, but I don't know why I even bothered, seeing as I'd been the one to ask to spend time with him. "I'll be in the cafe across the road. You know the one, right?"

He nodded again then turned to resume his task.

That was officially the dumbest thing I'd ever done, but I was too overjoyed by the thought of achieving a result to even think of feeling embarrassed. Clearly my initial intention hadn't been to ask him out like that. The magazines made it sound like I'd be the one doing the accepting, but a result was a result.

The small coffee shop was packed when I got in, not many places stayed open past six in that part of the city. I waited until a window seat became free and rushed to lay claim to it. That way I'd be able to see when Paul came out of the supermarket. Not that I thought he'd back out. Okay, I did, a little. He could have simply said yes to get rid of me. Goodness, I was nervous. Just because everyone at school knew my name and running schedule, people expected me to be good at this whole boy-girl game, but I was rubbish at it. I'd never really worked out how to deal with the crazy attention I got and my usual reaction was to laugh or make a joke and flee scenes as soon as possible. Just like I'd tried to do with Brandon, which obviously hadn't gone too well.

In fact the whole incident the night before had been weirder than weird. Brandon hadn't eased up like he usually did, and only heaven knows why I'd gone into that side alley to escape him. If you're trying to get away from someone, you don't walk into a space where there are less people in sight. I'd watched enough scary movies to work that one out. But my body seemed to have a mind of its own and I'd found myself facing Paul.

Funny thing was, I was expecting to get some stick from Brandon at school but he didn't even look at me. Not once. Not even when I walked past him to get to my seat in English class. Maybe he was mortified by his behaviour. Good. I was getting tired of declining his offers anyway. How many ways could you possibly say no to a guy without pulling your hair out?

I worked out Paul's shift ended at seven thirty so I took out my Maths notebook. Solving sums always drew me into a bubble; I figured it'd be the perfect thing to pass the hour. When it was nearly half seven, I ordered another green tea and got him a coffee. It was probably a little late for coffee but it felt like a safer choice than tea. Everyone else seemed to love the awful bitter taste.

Paul emerged from the store a little later than I'd anticipated, his usual uniform of T-shirt and faded jeans in tow. He'd swapped the Chilli Peppers branding for The Wallflowers. I wondered if he'd actually seen any of the many bands he sported so proudly. Probably not, if he had to work at the supermarket to make money; concert tickets cost a small fortune. Unless he worked to keep busy after school. I knew next to nothing about Paul Colt and I desperately wanted to change that.

"Hey," he greeted with a nod, sliding into the seat opposite me. Breezy, just like we were old friends.

There was a familiar faint smell of cigarette smoke and minty toothpaste on him, like he'd tried to get rid of the stench but hadn't succeeded. It wasn't unpleasant, just not the way I wanted him to smell.

"I got you coffee," I beamed, pushing the cup towards him as I tried to ignore the thought of who the scent reminded me of.

"Oh."

"Something wrong?"

"Tea is my preferred source of caffeine. Never really been a coffee drinker."

"Oh, right, sorry," I fumbled a little as I pulled back the cup and shoved mine towards him. "You can have my tea, I had one earlier. I haven't touched this one so it won't be like we're exchanging spit or anything."

What was wrong with me? Where were all these idiotic comments coming from?

He actually smiled; not a condescending kind of smile, more like he thought I was kidding around. If only!

"Don' worry about it, I'm sure I'll survive."

After that awkward exchange, we sat in silence for a few minutes as I waited for the ground to open and swallow me. He was probably wondering why he'd agreed to waste his time watching me sip tea and bite my cheek. I didn't blame him, I would have been itching to leave too. Problem was, I had no idea what to say now I had him there. I'd wasted the past hour doing sums instead of thinking up something witty and engaging to break us into easy flowing conversation.

"I'm not allowed to date."

"Excuse me?" He looked aptly confused by that random piece of information.

"That's why I was trying to get rid of Brandon yesterday. I wasn't leading him on; I don't want you to think that's what I do. I know kids at school think I'm a tease, but I'm just a girl who isn't allowed to date," I heard myself babbling on to fill the silence.

"Okay."

He wasn't making it easy for me. Why would he? He hadn't asked for any of this. Taking a deep breath, I carried on.

"It's a funny story really. My mother banned me from seeing anyone until I go off to university, or turn old enough to move out. All the women in her family were knocked up before they turned twenty...all of them, except her. She's keen to make sure I don't continue the family tradition."

His brows lifted, as if he found my story hard to believe, but he smiled and nodded again. "Okay."

Please say something else.

"I'm not allowed to date either."

I wasn't expecting that response and, for a moment, I thought he was pulling my leg.

"Totally different reasons though," he added, "but I guess we have something in common."

If you added non-coffee drinking to the list, we had two things in common, but I wasn't going to point that out to him. I sounded pathetic enough with all my nonsensical ramblings. I waited to see if he'd give a reason for his ban but he remained silent, staring at me like I had something on my face or in my hair. Definitely my hair.

My fingers ran through my hair to dislodge whatever it was he was fixated on and he quickly looked away, almost like he hadn't realised he was staring. A soft red tinge darkened his cheeks and I couldn't help grinning. Yep, Paul Colt was definitely affected by me.

"Why are we here?" he demanded suddenly. Embarrassment at being caught must have prompted the change in tone.

Good question. How could I explain my overwhelming urge to be with him without sounding like a total stalker?

"I just...I thought we could get to know each other. Outside of school and all. I don't have a lot of male friends and..."

"I have to go," Paul declared, shoving his chair back as he rose.

What? Where was he going? Our thirty minutes weren't up. I knew I hadn't given him any reason to want to stay, but I thought we were finally making progress.

"Wait." I heard the desperation in my voice but I didn't care. I had to stop him. Grabbing his hand, I covered it with both of mine. That stopped him. Actually it more than stopped him; it froze him in place, a glare taking over his face.

His hands were incredibly soft for someone who hauled boxes around.

Focus Nora!

"Do you believe in fate?"

"What? Why?"

"I wasn't going to walk behind that building yesterday. I never do. It always feels deserted and creepy and you never know what weirdo will be lurk..." I stopped myself but it was too late. I'd already inferred he was a weirdo. "Anyway, for some reason I did, you came to my rescue and now, here we are."

"So you think yesterday was meant to happen so we'd have this chat today." The way he spoke, it sounded like he thought I was a bit slow.

"You don't?"

My phone chose that second to buzz and I had to let go of his hand to silence it. Agnes' name flashed on the screen. I didn't bother answering. It was time to head home.

"You know what? Let's pretend none of this happened," I said, picking up my bag as I got up and brushed past him.

Yes, I walked out on him before he could walk out on me. And no, I wasn't giving up on Paul. Do I sound like the kind of girl who gives up after one attempt at anything? There'd be another day to try to make this thing with him work...whatever this was. It would work. It just had to.

But at that moment Agnes beckoned, and she didn't like to be kept waiting.
THREE

Paul

"What if I don't like her?"

"Like who?"

"The girl they choose for me. What if I don't want to be with her?"

The fridge door slammed as my father put away the bottle of milk he'd used to lighten his tea. It was probably not the wisest time to ask that question, but it was the sort of chat which could never be had at a good time.

"Where is this coming from, Paul? We've been over this countless times." His tone was much too even, almost like he was talking to a younger version of me. He only got that way when he wanted a quick end to a discussion. Getting emotional only ever prolonged matters.

He was right. We had gone over this, and a host of different topics related to my abilities, many times since our first revelatory talk. I had no say in the matter, no choice in my future, because of what I was. Because of what could happen if I knocked up the wrong type of woman, one not specially selected for her unique baby making skills. I knew bringing it up again was pointless but I had to. I needed him to tell me how ridiculous I was being.

I hadn't been able to get Nora out of my head for the last few days.

I'd thought about her lots of times before our encounter the other day, but those had been fleeting thoughts, harmless daydreams which evaporated once I scolded myself for being foolish. The way I felt after I walked her home was totally different. Maddening, really. Nothing I'd ever experienced prepared me for the stifling sensation which came over me that night when I lay in bed thinking of her. Thinking of what I'd done for her.

At first, I assumed I was having a panic attack and considered calling out to my father for help, but what would I have said to him? Dad, help! I'm freaking out because I'll never be able to hold her hand, look into those eyes, touch her hair...or press my lips against hers. He'd have smacked the thoughts right out of my head and gone back to bed. Maybe that's what I'd needed.

After Nora ignored me the next day at school, I'd convinced myself that things would settle down and I'd be able to cope once I fell off her radar. But then she walked up to me at the supermarket and began chatting away like we'd planned to meet up. Certified whack job behaviour. Or maybe she was just acting like most girls did; I was confused as hell, seeing as I had no female friends to compare her with. It had taken a while after she left the store for my nerves to settle, and thirty seconds of seeing her at the café for them to get rattled again.

"I just wondered what it'd be like if we had the chance to pick. Not a random girl off the street but, maybe, if we get to choose someone from a list, someone we might actually be attracted to..."

Maybe I'd be able to pick someone who reminded me of Nora. That wasn't too much to ask, was it?

My father stared at me for seconds which stretched out longer than I was comfortable with. He was probably wondering if I'd accidentally bashed my head in the shower.

"Paul, son, we don't get to choose. If everyone gets to pick a girl they fancy, who'd choose the not-too-pretty girls? It's not a meat market. These women sacrifice their bodies for the good of our kind and we should treat this like the sacred act it's meant to be. These rules have been in place for a long time to protect us. Stop torturing yourself with trivial concerns."

There, he'd said it. I was being foolish. If these women were willing to give up a couple of years of their lives to further our cause, who was I to complain? All I had to do was show up, do the deed (no one said I had to keep my eyes open) and take my son from her for training when the weaning period was over. My father had never given me a concrete answer when I asked where they found the child-bearing volunteers they assigned to us. All I knew was, after I got my kid, I'd never see her again. How messed up was that?

"Is there something I should know about? A girl at school? At work?" Dad asked with what sounded like genuine concern as he came over to stand beside me.

"No, there's no one."

I made sure not to answer too hastily or slowly so he wouldn't suspect I was lying. Thankfully he couldn't do the lie detecting thing on me because it didn't work on our kind.

Sighing with what I hoped was relief, he went back to his breakfast. "Look, I know this can't be easy for you, I've been there and I know what it feels like. Teenage hormones rage and try to take over, but you have to always remember we are not like everybody else. We have a duty to people out there and we cannot afford the luxury of such distractions."

Of course we couldn't. We were Averters, tasked with helping people escape harmful futures by rejigging their minds before they carried out the damning acts. I'm making it sound like a terrible fate, but it's not really. Without our help, there'd be far more misery in the world and a lot of guilt on our part.

We are born with our abilities so it's not like we have much choice in the matter. Once Averters reach a certain age, we begin to sense things about people others wouldn't, like when they're being dishonest. And then in our early teens, we feel our first jolt.

Yeah, I said jolt. That's what it feels like when the vision hits you; electrifying flashes of what a person will do which will mess up pretty much everything in their life from that moment on. Once we know what we're meant to stop, our task is to carry out an Aversion without the person knowing what's happening to them. That's kind of what I'd done to Brandon the other day, altered his memories so he wouldn't bother Nora anymore. But the error in what I'd done was that I hadn't carried out an Aversion to protect him; I'd done it to help her.

I'd do anything to protect Nora Brice.

"So, we're all good?" My drifting thoughts were interrupted by my father's voice and I nodded to reassure him of my commitment to the cause.

It didn't upset me when he dismissed my concerns about girls with such ease, even though I knew he had a mild obsession with Mrs Steelton at 423B. We'd moved into our building about six years ago and got the flat right below hers. Before that we'd lived a block away from her family home. Before that we'd been in a different town; and yes you guessed it, she lived in that town too. I was certain he had no idea I was aware of his feelings for her. My father was far too disciplined to ever make a move. Apart from the fact that we weren't allowed to indulge in romantic pursuits, she'd been married for over a decade and had a couple of kids to show for it. Home wrecking was not his style.

"Yeah, we're good. Thanks." I smiled in an attempt to dispel any worries he had.

His frown told me he wasn't buying my easy acceptance of the state of things, but he didn't push it. As he'd just noted, I was a teenager; my hormones were occasionally allowed to make me ask stupid questions.

I rushed the rest of my breakfast to escape his quiet stare, so I ended up getting to the bus stop a little earlier than planned. I hated waiting at bus stops. At least once a month, without fail, I'd had to carry out an Aversion on someone at one. Maybe I was just unlucky but I'd noticed the trend and tried to avoid peak hours when stops would be heaving. It was kind of impossible to do so when a bus journey was the only way to get to school.

I was definitely not in the mood to alter anyone's mind that morning. Not with my thoughts wound so tightly around self-pity.

"Hey, Pretty Boy," Cheung Yee dug his elbow into my side as I took a seat beside him when the bus finally arrived. No jolts had hit me and I'd relaxed a little. "Are you going to Keith's party on Saturday? I hear there'll be booze and loose women aplenty."

The elderly lady beside us turned to eye us with disapproval. I offered an apologetic smile but she huffed and looked away.

"Morning to you too, Cheese Face."

I wasn't being mean. Cheung had given himself the nickname years ago after he was hit with a nasty case of chicken pox which left his face riddled with tiny holes. He functioned on the logic that if you laughed at yourself before anyone else did, you'd turn out okay in life. Although the scars were now mostly gone, the unfortunate name had stuck. The religiously dyed straw yellow mop of hair which always covered his face didn't help either.

"And I hear Keith and Sandra are not standing on solid ground at the moment. This might be my time to make a move. What do you think?"

Cheung was the closest thing to a best friend I'd ever had. We were similar in quite a few ways; single parent upbringing (a mother in his case), a passion for what my father called ear splitting music, and a recent mutual fixation with stealing cigarettes off our parents. He listened to me on the few occasions I complained about my father, and I did the same for him when he wanted to whine about his mother. He was the only person who knew most things about me. Except for what I truly was.

Nobody at school knew what I was. Okay, that's not entirely true. The other dozen or so Averters who roamed our hallways knew me. Question, how do you spot an Averter? Answer, if you can't read a vibe off someone, they are most likely one. Either that or your abilities needed fixing. The guys at school were reasonably nice; we said hello to each other every now and then, but we weren't friends. That wasn't unusual. Most Averters I'd met weren't too sociable with other Averters, although we maintained a level of civility to acknowledge our kinship.

"Earth to Paul," Cheung snapped his fingers in my face.

"No, I don't think you'd stand a chance if they're still officially together. Those two are like magnet and metal. And no, I can't make it. I've got work."

"But it's a night-time thing. You're not working that late. Come on, you know I need someone to help me fight off the ladies."

Cheung's downturned lips were supposed to make me cave but I couldn't go. Parties were the worst places for me to be. People do stupid things all the time but when alcohol is thrown into the mix, bad decisions generally escalate. I had to attend one or two events over the years to avoid looking like a recluse, but I hadn't enjoyed them.

"Sorry Cheung, not this time. You're going to have to take on all those lovely ladies yourself."

"Your loss. My sources tell me a certain Miss Brice is going to be there too. I'm thinking she might finally look your way if someone loosens her up with some nicely fermented drinks..."

I hadn't told Cheung about my encounter with Nora. Some stories weren't meant to be shared lightly, plus I knew he'd tease me about it until I got pissed off.

"As tempting as that sounds, I can't. Maybe you can put in a good word for me. That is if you can escape from under the mob of girls fighting over you." I winked, hoping light banter would placate him. It worked.

"Alright, alright. But don't come crying to me when you hear it was the one time she finally decided to suck face with a guy at a party. That guy might even be me."

I laughed and waved my hand in his face when he started making kissing noises. That was one of the many things I liked about Cheung. He never dwelt on stuff, choosing to work his way through life in fleeting bursts of energy. The topic was swiftly changed to some other interest of his and I spent the rest of the bus ride sniggering at his remarks. The woman he'd upset earlier on was desperately trying not to listen to us and I didn't want to make her journey any more unpleasant.

When we arrived at school, Cheung and I split up to head to our respective lockers. We didn't share many classes so lunchtime would be our next chance to hang out. I had PE first thing so I needed to dump my backpack before heading to the changing rooms.

"Whoa, easy! I didn't see you there."

The heavy smack that landed on my back came shortly after the words. The speaker clearly intended for me to know that this was no accident.

I spun round, fist clenched as I fought to steady myself. The last time anyone had attempted to accidentally knock me about at school, I'd received a caution and community service. That had been three years ago. In my defence, he'd swung first. It wasn't my fault that I'd broken his nose. How was I to know that my punch packed so much power?

Brandon.

If I thought I'd been mistaken, his smirk confirmed my initial assumption.

I'd never had any trouble with the footballer before. Despite his behaviour the other night, Brandon was one of the nice guys. Even though he was occasionally known to hang out with some questionable characters, they were his football buddies. He kind of had to be friends with them to keep the team spirit up or something. Brandon was not bully material.

I eased open my tightened fists.

"You think you're some kind of hero, huh?" Brandon leaned in close; I could feel his hot breath on my face.

Something wasn't right.

Ah, of course, I'd manhandled him two nights ago.

I'd told him not to bother Nora and, from what I'd observed the day before, it looked like that had sunk in. But I hadn't asked him to forget the incident altogether; there hadn't been any need for that. All he recalled was that, for some unfathomable reason, I'd humiliated him in front of Nora and she'd chosen me over him. It must have bugged him more since I wasn't friends with her at school. Maybe it even angered him.

I wondered if I should risk altering his mind again to get him off my back, but I shook the thought away. He was, sort of, the victim now.

"No Brandon. I just don't think it's cool to follow unwilling girls down alleys."

I turned to shut my locker and started to walk away. People were beginning to look at us and I didn't want the attention.

"Look," Brandon stepped in my way and I felt my fists ball up again. "Just because you walk around school acting like you don't care what people think about you, don't think I can't make you wish you were truly insignificant. I see through your smoke screen, Colt."

I knew it was all talk, the knots working away in my gut were never wrong, but I let him speak. He needed to get it out of his system.

"Nora only cozied up to you because that's what girls like her do when they really want to play up to guys like me. They find the safest possible distraction and latch on to it, just long enough for us to get jealous. You'll never be anything more to someone like her. Never."

Damn, I really must have bruised his ego. Silence was the only response I could think of to quell the matter so I let him stick his face in mine for a little longer. When he realised I wasn't going to say anything, he straightened up and glanced at the crowd that was beginning to gather around us. Then, adding a final chuckle, he walked away.

I watched his departing figure until the blood which had rushed to my head began to settle.

Fine. If that's the way he wanted to play it.

"Hey Cheung, wait up. What time did you say that party was again?"
FOUR

Nora

I've never been a fan of parties. Actually, that's not entirely true; I used to love attending them until I turned fourteen. That's when innocence died a horrible death and parties suddenly became unchaperoned events where the main goal was for people to hook up with each other. Gone were the rhythm-defunct dance moves which left us all giggling at the end of the bubble gum songs we loved so much. Enter awkward slow dancing and general unsightly shenanigans in dimly lit rooms. To be fair, not all parties were that bad, but it kind of got boring when all everyone wanted to do was sneak in booze and fondle each other.

Keith's party was no different. We'd been there just over an hour and half of the lights in the room had already been switched off. Fortunate enough not to live in a block of flats like most of us, his parents had converted their basement into a den for him and his older brother. Our cheap alcohol supply was probably thanks to said brother. Who knows where his parents had wandered off to that weekend? And who cared? As long as we kept the noise down, all would be well.

"Great party, right?" Theresa, one of my track mates, sat beside me on the grey lumpy sofa I'd occupied the second I walked in. My warm soda was nowhere near being finished and I intended to hog it for a little longer.

"Yeah, great," I grinned as I raised the plastic cup to my lips. If she thought this was great, our standards were so not on the same level.

"And Devan's been staring at you for ages. Maybe he'll finally get the guts to come over. Urgh, I don't want to move. You'll have to go with him, even if all you're going to do is turn him down." She laughed at this and Stacey, sitting to my right, high-fived her.

They were amongst the select few who knew about my dating ban and they thought it was amazing that I stuck to my guns about it. Stacey had only been allowed to start dating last year, but she and Jordan had officially been an item a year before that. In fact, their little romance began at a party not too dissimilar to this one.

"Crap, I think he's coming over," Theresa cringed. "Get ready to scoot."

I hadn't looked Devan's way when she'd pointed him out initially but now I had to. Crap, he really was heading over to the sofa. And Theresa was right, he had to be coming for me as she was currently in an on-and-off relationship with Malik. I was the only singleton sitting there.

"I'll come and drag you back here in two minutes, okay," Stacey offered with a sympathetic pat on my back. Goodness, could Devan hear any of this?

"What the..."

There was a loud thud in the corner, causing our focus to shift from Devan to the group of people who'd been standing by the door. Whatever was happening was obscured from our vision by a wave of kids rushing over to the scene.

"Sounds like a fight. Go, go, go!" Theresa pushed me towards the gathering. Other than the lure of underage drinking and the possibility of a snog session, nothing beat a good fight at a party. We were even willing to give up our places on the sofa for first hand viewing of a scuffle.

We got to the door just as Paul's fist connected with Brandon's jaw. One punch was all it took to floor the footballer. One punch! Gasps from some of the other bystanders told me I wasn't the only one surprised. Even though I'd seen how easily Paul had handled Brandon before, I didn't really think he had that kind of power in him. Or that he was a brawler. Other than one stint of trouble a few years back, Paul tended to stay away from conflict. And so did Brandon.

Something told me whatever they were fighting about was connected to the other night. And there was only one linking factor.

Me.

We watched as Paul dropped to his knees to check how much damage had been done. Hospitalizing Brandon was clearly not part of his plan. It was only when he looked up with relief that some of the other football kids snapped out of their shock and started to rush towards him. That was when Paul's friend, Cheung, called out to him and began to clear a path through the bodies blocking his escape route.

Paul looked up calmly, almost as if he wasn't bothered by the fact that he would soon be crushed by a mass of ticked off teenagers. His green eyes seemed to be searching for something in the crowd. They only stopped when they settled on me. Yep, their fight definitely had something to do with me.

I don't think anyone else noticed who he was looking at because he didn't dwell on me for long. It actually felt like once he saw I had witnessed his behaviour, he was done with the scene, because he sprang up then and raced for the door. The others weren't quick enough to catch him as he sprinted up the steps and, I assumed, out of the house. Half a dozen or so footballers followed suit and the rest of us realised the show was over. Anyone who wanted to witness the conclusion would have to follow them. There was still too much alcohol left in the basement for people to seriously consider leaving.

Some of Brandon's other friends helped him up and led him to one of the sofas. He didn't look too bad, just a little shaken up.

"He kind of asked for it," I heard one guy say to another. "He was dissing Paul upstairs and followed him down here. Something about showing him how he wasn't so tough."

"Ha! He probably regrets messing with him now. After what happened with Paddy, I knew Paul had a good swing in him. Brandon's lucky his nose is still intact."

I couldn't stay there. Unless something else huge happened, their fight was going to be the main topic of discussion all night. I was already driving myself nuts wondering whether the guys had caught up with Paul and Cheung. What would they do to them if they did? I had to go after him. It was a stupid idea, but I had to find out if he was alright.

Just so it wouldn't look too obvious, I let a couple of minutes go by before glancing at my phone as I mumbled something to the girls about leaving early.

"But your ride's not due for another couple of hours," Theresa's eyes narrowed.

"I don't feel too well," I thought fast, touching my belly. "Awful cramps, you know?"

Every girl knew what that meant and no one was going to try to convince me to stay. I only felt a little bit guilty as I accepted their sympathetic hugs and kisses and requests for me to ring them once I got off the bus. Funnily enough, no one offered to accompany me home. I guess free booze really did trump most things.

Upstairs, I found the football team camped out in the kitchen, downing beers as they chatted away loudly. Relief washed over me. Paul had to be okay, they wouldn't have returned so quickly if they'd found him to pummel. But I still couldn't stay. My body had decided where it needed to be and Keith's house wasn't it.

Once I left the house, I ran all the way to the bus stop, changed buses a couple of times and got off a few blocks away from home. The main street was buzzing with people, but once I turned into the alley beside the derelict courthouse, it was as if I'd stepped into another world. Traffic noise was heavily muted by the mass of the building so there was an air of serenity I hadn't quite noticed the other night; probably because I had been trying to evade Brandon. As I got to the back, the hard edge of the courthouse dissolved into an overgrown, yet beautifully designed, square. No wonder Paul chose there as a hideaway.

"Hey."

Paul looked up as I approached him. He was sitting on the building's back steps, staring into space. He didn't appear startled at all by my intrusion. Really weird because even I was surprised by my actions. There was no reason for me to have known he'd return there and yet I'd found him.

"Hey," he nodded at me. I noticed an unlit cigarette balanced loosely on his knuckles. He rolled it up and down his fingers as he carried on looking at me.

Now I was there, I wasn't sure what to do, so I stood staring at him for a few seconds, taking in his familiar features. His T-shirt band of the day was The Offspring, but it looked like he'd made an attempt to dress up for the party because he wasn't wearing his usual manky sneakers. He'd swapped those for a clean pair.

Why did he have to come across as lost and vulnerable, despite the fact he'd knocked out a guy nearly double his weight without flinching. For the first time since I'd started my mission to win him over, I wondered if hanging out with Paul Colt was a bad choice. They always said the quiet ones were the ones to watch out for, right? But I shook the thought out of my head. He couldn't be dangerous. He just couldn't.

When it began to feel like neither of us was going to say anything else, I decided to take action. After all, I was the one invading his sanctuary. Walking up the steps, I settled myself beside him, inhaling his strangely intoxicating scent of mint and citrus. He'd definitely made an effort for the party. Why else would he have worn cologne? I was mostly relieved he didn't smell of cigarette smoke.

"Can I see?"

Paul glanced at my outstretched hands and frowned lightly before shrugging and raising his right hand. He still hadn't asked what I was doing there or how I'd known he'd be there, but I had a feeling he wasn't going to make that enquiry.

His hand was cool to the touch, even though the night air was warm. His long fingers looked almost comical in my small palms as I turned them around to inspect his knuckles.

"Looks like it'll need some ice. Got any on you?" I joked and, thank heavens, his frown softened into a grin. I tried to ignore the flutter in my chest; how could dimples be so, so sexy?

"Thanks." The word came out as a whisper as I held on to his hand, our eyes locked in an unbreakable link.

"For what?" My question was whispered to match his tone.

"For coming after me."

"I only aim to please."

Did I just say that? It was official, my brain cells turned to mush whenever he was around. I'd manage to spew nonsense every single time I'd spoken to him. In an attempt to hide my mortification, I laughed and dropped his hand.

"I guess I just figured...someone has to look out for you." It was only after saying the words out loud that I realised it really was the reason I was there. I wanted to be the one who looked out for him.

"That's why I have Cheung."

"What? Is he hiding behind that bush over there?"

Another short chuckle from him. I loved that I could do that to him, make him laugh. If only I could make him smile forever. Urgh, foolish thoughts floating about in my head again. I looked down at my hands and began playing with them to distract myself from the thought of forever with him.

We sat in silence for a few minutes, but it didn't feel awkward. It felt comfortable; familiar, almost. Like we'd done this before, plenty of times. Like we'd become so used to being around each other that words weren't needed to fill the space between us. Yet, we hadn't.

When I looked up again, I noticed Paul was staring at me. He might have been watching me all that time and I hadn't noticed.

"I know this sounds strange but..."

"You want to touch my hair?" I finished for him.

"How did you..."

I laughed. "You keep staring at it, like you don't think it's real. I'm just happy you haven't got a foot fetish. I've got runner's feet. Not the prettiest of sights on anyone."

And then, before he could respond, I took his unbruised hand and guided it to my nape. His fingers were still cold as they touched my skin then gently snaked their way up to my scalp. I could have sworn I heard his breath catch at the same time mine lodged itself in my chest.

That was the moment Paul Colt kissed me.
FIVE

Paul

Something was wrong with me. It had to be. Why else would I have thought kissing Nora Brice was a good idea? I'd always figured my first time would be with my chosen child bearer. That is, if she let me kiss her at all. I'd wondered whether there'd be limits on what we were allowed to do. Boundaries on how much affection we could show each other, just in case we realised we fancied each other and decided to do something scandalous, like elope.

Let's face it, I'd also wondered what it'd be like to kiss Nora. Deluded teenage boy spending countless hours fantasising about a gorgeous girl; not much of a surprise there, really. Despite my freaky abilities, I was still just a guy who liked a girl. But that was where I thought those fancies would remain, locked tightly away in my head.

The thing was, I didn't have much choice in the matter. With her slightly parted lips so close to mine and her strawberry scented hair in my open palm, everything I'd been taught about maintaining restraint flew out of my head as a savage heat took over my senses.

My God, her hair was even softer than I'd imagined it'd be. She'd worn it in soft curls that night, probably in an attempt to look glamorous for the party. There'd been no need for the effort. She'd have been stunning even if her hair was concealed under a hat, or completely shaved off. Not that I'd ever tell her that. I'd never suggest anything which would take away any of the elements that were making the moment so perfect.

Her lips, rounded cushions of softness, pressed up against mine. Her skin, bronzed and glowing in the warm light of the street lamp, a lovely contrast to my paleness. Our already slightly ragged breaths quickened in unison as my free hand cupped her face in place, pulling her close to me. Her hands stretched up to my back, pulling me in even closer.

After so many months of longing, the real life act of kissing Nora was a gazillion times better than I'd dreamt it would be. Better than anything else I'd ever experienced in my life. What we were doing was wrong, forbidden, but I couldn't stop myself. I couldn't let go of the small body which clung to mine. Now I knew how amazing she felt, how incredible her lips tasted, how was I supposed to go back to waiting out the years till I turned twenty one? How was I supposed to let her walk off into the sunset with someone who wasn't me?

What startled me the most wasn't the fact I had let myself cross a line I had known not to test. Or the fact that kissing Nora felt like the truest thing I'd ever done. No, what freaked me out the most was that she was actually kissing me back.
SIX

Nora

Right, confession time. I'd kissed a couple of guys before that night with Paul. It's not really a huge confession, I was sixteen and guys had been hounding me for the last three years or so. It was inevitable that I'd have dipped my toes in the water, just to see what all the fuss was about. Plus I'd taken care to watch what people in movies did; tilt your head, try not to part your lips too wide, that kind of thing. Don't even get me started on what the teen magazines I read suggested. I often wondered if the article writers had forgotten who their target audience was.

But I wasn't one of those girls who waited anxiously for opportunities to swap spit with any guy who asked her. Technically Paul hadn't asked. If it had been any other guy, I'd have shoved him off and whacked him in the face, hard. But it was Paul. A part of me had wanted him to kiss me from the second I saw him sitting there on his own. I had a feeling if he hadn't gone for it, I'd have spent the rest of the night crying into my pillow.

Had I daydreamed about that moment in the past? Uhuh! More than a couple of times a week for the last few months. Deeply distracting thoughts I never imagined would come true, because I never thought Paul would admit to liking me. He was a hard one to crack. By our school standards, he could have been one of the popular kids. Good-looking, courteous (most of the time), pretty smart (going on his performance in Physics class), and laid back about stuff (except when he was punching out jerks). Yet he chose to fly under the radar and showed no real interest in anyone other than Cheung. Mind boggling, really.

I already suspected he was interested in me before the drama with Brandon. I'd caught him watching me in class and at lunch breaks, but he always acted like he wasn't looking whenever I caught his eye. I had been a little confused when he'd freaked out the other day at the café when I'd suggested we become friends.

Which is why, as I sat there with his lips fused to mine, his heady scent filling every pore of my body, his hand tugging away intently at my hair, I wasn't sure if I had drifted off into a daydream again. I wanted to pinch myself to confirm it was real, but that involved letting go of him and I wasn't ready for that yet. So I let myself enjoy the little shudders of bliss rippling through my body.

It felt like hours had gone by when I finally slowly pulled away to catch my breath. Opening my eyes, I looked into his dilated pupils, our chests rising and falling in an identical heavy rhythmic motion. Had I really just been kissed by Paul Colt?

His hands grazed my cheeks, still holding my face in place so he could look into my eyes. He grinned, and I smiled back. Then he chuckled, and I giggled too. Damn it, why did his smile have to be so cute?

"I probably shouldn't have done that," he whispered without a hint of regret in his voice.

I shrugged and rolled my eyes. "It's not like one kiss means we're now boyfriend and girlfriend, or something."

"Because you're not allowed to date."

"And you're not allowed to either."

The crippling truth hung in the air between us, yet we carried on smiling, because it didn't matter. Nothing did.

"You know, for a little while I wasn't sure if you were into me." Somehow I felt brave enough to admit my fears to him. Kissing him seemed to have done wonders to my tongue.

He raised a brow and tilted his head to the side. "Nora, Nora, Nora. I've always liked you. It was just kind of impossible to let you know."

"The no dating thing?"

He hesitated slightly before nodding. Why didn't I believe him?

"So why did you try to run off at the café? You made me think I was creeping you out."

Another chuckle from him. "Because you're Nora Brice."

What was that meant to mean? He'd said it like I was supposed to get it. "So?"

Sighing, he lifted his head. "Let me rephrase that. Beautiful little heart breaker, friend to everyone, dater of none. You said it yourself; people think you're a bit of a tease. I wasn't sure what you were playing at."

I must have stiffened because his smile faltered as his eyes narrowed.

"I shouldn't have said that. I know you're not a tease. You're just like me, caught in a weird place with few options."

I wasn't sure I believed him. Bloody stupid ban! Why couldn't I have come from a family of female assassins or pathological liars? Why did their problem have to be promiscuity? If at least one of them had managed to keep her legs closed, I might have been able to go out on dates like everyone else. I didn't care much about what people at school thought but I hated that Paul had bought into the idea of me being a flirt. I hadn't given him any reason not to, but I was still annoyed.

He must have mistaken my continued silence for anger towards him.

"Do you need to go?" His voice was a little shaky.

"No, not yet."

That was a lie. I should have checked my watch and called Agnes to let her know she didn't need to pick me up from the party because I was going to find my way home. But that single action would have drawn me back into the real world, a place where Paul's green eyes might never ever be this close to mine again. I didn't want to leave the potent bubble we'd been drawn into, not yet.

"But I might kiss you again," Paul teased, leaning forward to graze my lips with his.

"I'm not complaining."

As much as I wanted him to, he didn't kiss me. Instead he pulled my head on to his shoulder and held me tight. Fine, if he wanted to sit in silence, I could do that too. As long as I could remain close to him and not head home.

"Tell me something about you I don't know."

We would probably have sat in content quietness if he hadn't spoken.

Something about myself?

"Like what?"

"I don't know; something simple. What's your favourite colour?"

I lifted my head to make sure he wasn't kidding. "That's very basic boring stuff. Are you sure you don't want to hear something riveting?"

He shook his head as he steered mine back on to his shoulder. "Boring stuff's the important stuff."

I wasn't going to argue with him. "Alright, I'll play along, but this is silly. I've always been drawn to green. It reminds me of spring, regrowth, a chance to start over and get things right. I never liked pink like I was told I was supposed to. Agnes kept trying to dress me up in hideous shades of it because that's what the geniuses at the stores stocked."

Now that I thought about it, it made sense that I liked green so much. I'd been preparing myself to fall for the colour of his eyes.

"Who's Agnes?"

Crap, I hadn't intended for her name to slip out.

"My mother."

It was his turn to shift, bumping my head off his body. "You call your mother by her first name?"

Why did people always think it had been my idea in the first place?

"And I call my father David. Trust me, they'd freak out if I called them Mum and Dad. Well, Agnes would, for sure. She has something against the word. Says it ages her. David doesn't mind so much, as long as I stay out of trouble and get good grades."

He was still looking at me like there was something wrong with that setup. People always thought it was weird, which is why I usually remembered to refer to them differently at school.

"What do you call yours then? Daddy dearest? Precious Mummy?"

I wished I hadn't asked the question the second I saw a strain line touch his forehead. "It's just me and my Dad. My mother left when I was very young. I don't have any memories of her."

Great work, Nora. I was the only one capable of wrecking the perfect mood I'd been trying to preserve.

"That must have been awful." I didn't know what else to say, so I put my head back on his shoulder and laced my arm around his waist. All my problems with Agnes and David seemed trivial compared to an absentee parent.

"Not really." Despite his frown, his tone sounded like he genuinely didn't mind. "I got used to the idea pretty quickly. It might have been worse if she'd left when I was older."

It was time to navigate the conversation back to cheerier topics.

"Alright, it's my turn to ask a question. What was your first pet? I've heard your choice of animal says a lot about who you are."

Turns out he hadn't owned one. His father had too much on his plate to indulge in the responsibility of taking care of an unnecessary animal. Fair point. We talked about my gold fish instead. Who knew I had so many fond memories of Goldie after all that time? When we were done with Goldie, we moved on to favourite music (mine obviously, as he literally wore his on his chest every day), then favourite food, and on and on we went, covering more basic stuff than I ever imagined we could come up with in one night. It was only when we touched on our first adventure that I strayed into dark territories again. I usually never let my defences drop so much that I'd make two slips in one night, but Paul seemed to have a loosening effect on me.

"I was two towns away by the time they found me," I snorted, concluding the tale of the time I'd run away from home at the grand old age of eight.

"You hated home so much?" I didn't expect to hear sadness in his voice. When I'd told the story to my girlfriends, we just laughed and ignored the seriousness of it. Kids ran away from home all the time, right?

"Hey, don't judge me. They made me call them Agnes and David and then forced me to join the track team. I was convinced my real parents were somewhere out in the world looking for me."

Again, he was supposed to laugh, but he didn't. For the first time that night, I started to feel uncomfortable, like I'd finally shared too much. What had I been thinking? Telling him I accidentally killed my goldfish was one thing, but revealing I wasn't always happy at home might have been too much for him to hear on our first...goodness, it wasn't even a date! I'd ambushed him at the back of a building and somehow turned the whole night into something it wasn't supposed to be. This time, as my eyes flickered to my watch, my brain didn't try to stop it.

"Is that the time? I have to go." I sprang up and dusted the seat of my dress. Paul started to rise with me but I held him down. "Don't. I'll be quicker on my own."

He got up anyway but made no move to follow me as I started to scurry away. My heart sank at the thought of not stealing a final kiss or hug from him, but I couldn't dwell on it. I was already going to be in a world of trouble.

I was halfway down the path when I remembered something I'd wanted to ask earlier.

"Paul," I called out as I turned around, but there was no need to. He was still standing, looking at me. "Are you going to be okay? You know, with Brandon?"

Paul didn't do much smirking so I was surprised when one broke out on to his face.

"Yeah," he nodded, "that's been taken care of."

I wondered when he'd found time to resolve anything with Brandon. He couldn't have doubled back to the party to speak to him and somehow made it back to the courthouse before I got there. But he said those words with a lot of confidence; maybe Cheung was sorting things out for him. Or maybe boys were more forgiving about punch outs than I'd thought.

I couldn't delay any longer so I nodded, then turned and legged it all the way home.
SEVEN

Paul

"If you don't stop grinning to yourself like a nutter, I swear I'm going to shove you off this seat," Cheung threatened, poking me with the pencil he'd been chewing on.

Laughing loudly, I snatched the pencil off him. "You mean, like this?" I asked, playfully punching him off the seat before he could work out what I was doing.

"Ow! What's gotten into you? Or should I be asking who you've gotten in..."

I smacked him on the head to stop him from finishing his sentence. The elderly lady, who tortured herself by always sitting beside us, was full on gaping by then.

"Oh my goodness, I'm right! You got off with someone." Cheung now also stared at me with mild shock.

"Stop it, Cheese Face," I hissed, making eye gestures towards the woman. But I hadn't denied his accusation. Even though I wasn't prepared to share the gory details with my nosy and much too loud friend, a part of me didn't want to lie to him about what had happened on Saturday.

To be honest, I still wasn't sure what had happened. There was a slight chance Brandon's fist had made contact with my face at the party, and I'd banged my head on something as I went down, and then dreamt the whole courthouse scene. Everything.

Down to the delectable way Nora's skin had felt up against mine.

I shook my head to clear the thought. For some inexplicable reason, the powers that be had heard my prayers and had let Saturday night happen. Why was I certain it hadn't been a dream? Because I'd never felt as alive as I did when I got home and lay in bed playing over every single second of the evening in my head. It wasn't just the fact that I'd surprised myself by kissing her; we'd talked for ages afterwards and I hadn't been bored once. I'd always thought if I broke the rules which had been set out for me as an Averter, I'd feel a little pang of guilt, a tiny measure of remorse at least. Something to weigh my spirits down and put me in the proper frame of mind to right the wrong I had committed.

Yet all I wanted was Nora.

Who knew a kiss could do such amazing things to the soul? I all but woke up singing on Sunday morning and managed to hold on to the potent mood all day, even during my humdrum three hours shift at work. I realised I had to control myself a little better when the store manager tapped me on the shoulder and told me off for whistling as I unloaded milk cartons. I don't think he'd ever seen me crack a smile before that day.

The only thing I was really concerned about was my father finding out. If Dad noticed my excessive joy, he'd want to know what was making his recently glum son so cheerful. I didn't plan on telling him how I felt about Nora; even if he claimed he understood what I was going through, he'd never approve of what I intended to do next. He would explain it away as a mistake that sometimes happened to our kind before common sense returned. He would insist I forget about Nora and focus on things I could control.

So how could I make it clear to him that being with Nora was the only thing that made sense to me?

My plan was simple, if he didn't think there was anything to worry about, then there'd be no questions asked and I wouldn't have to lie to him. I always felt like crap when I did, even though I knew he couldn't tell I was being deceptive. Maybe Averters were all born with an amplified sense of guilt which others didn't feel. Or maybe it was just the way I was wired. Either way, I figured avoidance of the discussion was technically not lying, so I'd dodged him most of Sunday. I wasn't sure how much longer I'd get away with it though.

"Who was it?" Cheung put his face right up against mine. He knew how much it pissed me off but it usually got me to focus on him when he wanted an answer. "Tell me. You know I'll bug you until you do."

"Geez Cheung, back off. It's not important. Don't you have a Chemistry test to worry about? "

"Eh, I'd only worry if I didn't study. Stop trying to distract me. Tell Brother Cheung all your secrets. You know I'd tell you mine if any girl decided I was worthy of making physical contact with. Is it someone I know? Someone from the party? Wait, did you go back after our big escape?"

At least he was asking questions I could answer without giving away who I'd been with, so I indulged him a little.

"Maybe."

"What does that mean? You went back to the party or she's someone we know? Was she one of the soppy eyed girls cheering you on when you slammed your fist into Brandon's face? Supreme move, by the way. Didn't see that one coming."

I would have responded to one of his multiple questions if my gut hadn't balled into a painful knot, a bright light blinding me as a vision took over my senses. I hadn't carried out an Aversion in days (messing with Brandon's mind twice didn't count) and, with all the euphoria I had been feeling lately, the vision hurt like hell.

It came from a curly haired guy sitting two rows ahead of us. He was one of the morning regulars on that route and, although I never spoke to him, he'd attended our school up until a few years ago. These days he left the bus about five stops before we did and probably went on to his job. I had no reason to care about what his job was until the vision hit me.

A middle-aged man was sprawled on the floor in a high-ceilinged room with stainless steel worktops and shelves; probably an industrial kitchen judging from the white coat wearing, hairnet donning occupants of the room. His right leg appeared to be trapped under a fallen cabinet; his cries of pain suggested it might be crushed. But that wasn't the worst part. As his co-workers rushed to his aid, curly haired guy was amongst the first to reach him. Then I watched in horror as his coat sleeve caught on a pan of oil sitting on the hob above the man on the floor.

I didn't need to see any more. My brain latched on to the crucial factors. The clock on the wall said it was past three, the sleeves of the red stripped shirt he wore on the bus poked out under his white coat. The incident was probably going to happen that afternoon. Sometimes what we had to prevent was meant to happen days later. Weeks even. I didn't have that luxury. More importantly, his stop was coming up soon so if I was going to act, I had to be fast.

"You might know her; pretty girl, goes to our school," I replied to Cheung's drilling so he wouldn't notice my attention was elsewhere. My hand slipped into my jacket pocket and found the slightly oversized pearl I always kept close by for situations like that.

Maintaining eye contact and feeding thoughts into people's heads isn't the only way to carry out an Aversion. Since it is not always possible to look into the eyes of those we are meant to help without being obvious, every Averter is assigned an Orb. What the round objects lack in size, they make up for in astounding strength. The seemingly ordinary item I held had the ability to amplify my abilities and channel them towards curly haired guy even from the distance between us. All I had to do was make sure he wasn't speaking to anyone else as I tried to carry out the Aversion. Undivided attention was needed for my words to take root.

You will forget I spoke these words to you once I'm done. Whatever you do, make sure you leave work by noon today. Feign illness or an emergency at home, just make sure you leave and don't return for the day. If possible, don't return tomorrow either.

The last bit was just in case he was one of those people who had no problem wearing the same shirt two days in a row. I didn't want to stop him from going to work for the rest of the week, so that would have to do. The only annoying thing about using the Orb was I didn't get the satisfaction of seeing the blue flash in his eyes. From experience, I knew he'd heard me. The rest was now up to him.

"Are you even listening to me?" Cheung threw his hands up in the air with defeat. "Was she so amazing that all you're going to do today is drift in and out of consciousness as you think of her?"

I grinned. If only he'd seen me the day before.

"Oh yeah, she was. But if you keep whining like a little girl, I'm not going to tell you what happened when I finally burst out of my fluffy love coma so, zip it Cheung."

I might not have helped matters by saying that, but it shut him up, temporarily. The badgering would continue at school, which was fine by me. I could deflect it better if I wasn't trapped in a tin can.

Curly haired guy got off the bus shortly afterwards and the rest of the ride was uneventful, with Cheung's diverted interest on the test he claimed to have studied for. At least he'd chosen not to sulk; which would have made me feel worse.

The day turned out to be one of the dullest in my school history, probably because I had been on such a high over the weekend. More likely because I kept looking out for Nora's wavy auburn hair in the hallway between classes and at the cafeteria, but it was almost like she'd not come to school.

I usually worked Monday shifts at the supermarket and should have headed there after the last bell went. Instead I found myself walking in the direction of the sports centre located two blocks away from school. It was one we shared with the local community. Being an inner city institution, we didn't have much land to carve up, so sharing was the only way the school could offer students the chance to participate in outdoor sports. I only went to the centre when I had PE but I figured Nora would be training there with the rest of her team. There was a meet coming up soon, the last one before our end of year exams.

I flashed my school ID at the lady at reception. She didn't bother checking if I was scheduled to be in the building before she returned to pretending not to read her novel. It was the only reason I'd come there; nobody took much notice of the facilities users. If I approached Nora at school, we'd have an audience, something I knew neither of us wanted.

A group of about a dozen kids were racing around the tracks when I plunked myself onto a bench. Finding Nora wasn't difficult. Her hair held back in a knot, the toned muscles of her thighs straining against shorts that were barely there, her arms flying up and down the sides of her determined face as she crossed the finish line ahead of her teammates.

I'd never seen Nora run. Knowing of her success was one thing, but sitting and watching my schoolmates excel in their chosen sport of torture was not my style. Maybe I should have rethought the theory a long time ago. Her mother might have shot me just for looking at her in her running attire.

Nora always wore fairly modest dresses, even in the summer months, so I was completely thrown by the sight of the scantily clad girl leaning on her knees, trying to catch her breath as her coach yelled something at her. She finally stood up straight and nodded before accepting the bottle of orange liquid he offered her. Then she leaned into a stretch.

My goodness, she was stunning.

Any chance of me making my shift disappeared as I settled down to wait out the long training session. There was no way I was going to leave without talking to her. She'd stalked me out at the store the other day; I guess it was my turn to show her I wanted to spend time with her. My actions on Saturday night might have implied a lot, but I needed her to know for certain.

"Hey," I called out when she came out of the changing rooms with her teammates. Their wrinkled brows at the sight of me was almost comical.

Nora didn't seem to notice. Beaming as she slipped her hair out of the knot it was held in, she started walking towards me. "It's okay, I'll call you later," she said to one of the girls without looking back.

So much for discretion. I could have been there to swap Physics notes with her, or to do something else related to our academics. As long as I didn't hug her in front of them; or try to breathe in her intoxicating scent. It wasn't easy, but I managed to control myself. The group hesitated for a second before bounding off to do whatever it was they did after their training session. Probably to replace the five thousand or so calories they'd each just burned.

Nora didn't look like she had food on her mind as she sauntered up to me and placed her hands on her hips. She'd changed into a lilac pleated dress which stopped just above her knees. Even though they were all covered up, all I could think about were her thighs. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea for me to have watched her practise.

"Fancy seeing you here, System of a Down," her eyes flashed to the band name on my shirt. "Don't tell me you've decided to take up a school sport. Or are you here to see little old me?" She ended with an exaggerated gasp.

My smile answered for me. We weren't alone in the lobby but none of the people around us were young enough to attend our school. I took a daring step towards her and she didn't move back, so I took another. There was no way I would ever be able to eat strawberries again without thinking of how great she smelled.

"What's wrong with your face?"

The words came out before I could stop them. I had intended to say something witty or flirty; something to suggest I had thought about her and her alone for the last two days. Something to show I wanted to whisk her away from prying eyes and kiss her until she couldn't think straight. The almost perfectly covered up bruise on her left cheek knocked all that out of my head.

Nora's eyes widened. Maybe she hadn't realised I'd notice. Seriously, how could she think I wouldn't? I'd mastered every line and curve of her face on Saturday. A bit of makeup, however well applied, made no difference to what I knew was there.

"Nothing. Sheesh, can't a girl try to look pretty without getting the third degree?" She probably didn't intend for her laugh to sound forced as she stepped back and tilted her face away from mine.

"Doesn't look like nothing to me." I started to reach up to turn her face back towards me but she took another step away.

She obviously didn't know I could tell she was lying, even without the ridiculous face paint. Sighing, she rolled her eyes and turned away completely. "Look Paul, just because we made out once, doesn't mean you know me."

"Wait." I couldn't let her just walk off so I kept in stride with her. "Is this why you ran away from home?"

Fishing was the only way I could think of getting anything out of her. I was trying really hard to stop the rage that welled in my chest but I could feel the heat soaring.

Nora stopped so abruptly that I carried on walking before realising I was alone.

"And there it is." Her hands were back on her hips but not in a provocative way.

"There is what?"

"The reason I shouldn't have opened up to you. Now you're going to psychoanalyse everything I do or say because I let you in on one stupid thing that happened a long time ago."

Her lips might have said one thing but her body screamed another. I could sense she wanted me to know what had happened; she just didn't know how to tell me without getting someone in trouble.

"Listen to me Nora, if he hits you, it doesn't matter what he makes you think. You are the victim."

Her mouth dropped open, tears lining her lower lids. "David does not hit me." Her words were clipped, and so was the pain from the finger she poked in my chest. "He's never raised a hand on me in his life."

I was too stunned to stop her as she brushed past me and ran out of the building. The others in the lobby watched me, probably wondering what I'd done or said to make the pretty little runner cry. I didn't care. I was more confused by the fact that the last words Nora had spoken to me had been true.
EIGHT

Nora

Being grounded sucked. How come we always forget how precious our freedom is until it is taken away from us? On a typical Monday night, I would have been at home anyway, watching telly or on the phone with one of my friends. Yet knowing I wasn't allowed to leave the house made me itch for a café or the steps of Theresa's front porch.

I had known there was a strong possibility punishment would come, but I had thrown caution to the wind and ignored my phone on Saturday night. In hindsight, it was a foolish thing to have done for a couple of hours of solace with Paul. He was just a guy, an annoyingly nosy guy. If boring questions were so important, why had I been the one doing almost all the talking? If I hadn't been so careless with my words, he wouldn't have jumped to the totally wrong conclusion about David earlier on.

There were much easier ways to get a snog off a guy. If that was all I wanted, I should have cut short our bonding session right after I got it. Plenty of other guys would have obliged and not resulted in me being stuck at home for the rest of the week. But, given another chance, I knew I'd have stayed out late again. The only guy I wanted to share a snog with was Paul. He was the only person I wanted to tell my boring old stories to; the only one whose stories I wanted to listen to in return. How lame was that?

"Where's your father?" Agnes's slightly elevated voice cut through my reminiscing.

I turned down the volume on the game show I'd been blankly staring at. The only good thing about being grounded was my TV privileges were not revoked. "I think he went down for a smoke."

Smoking was banned in the flat. Not even on our oversized balcony. Agnes was certain the smell would still find its way into the living room and choke us all to death. If she had her way, David would quit the habit with the flick of her fingers. Some things weren't that easy to control.

"Did he take his phone?" She began to rub her arm and I sat up straight. Her large brown eyes were slightly puffy and her lips were beginning to tremble. Everyone outside my family thought my mother was strong and beautiful, but when she got like that, she just looked frail and incredibly ordinary to me.

"No."

I could see the phone resting on the kitchen counter. So could she.

"I need him. I need your father. Has he been gone long?"

She didn't need him; I don't think she ever really did. She just wanted him back in the flat so she could keep an eye on the both of us.

Agnes wasn't always like that; I was partly responsible for her current panicked state. Last week had been a good one because she'd had no reason to worry. Then I'd put an unnecessary fear in her after she tried to reach me on Saturday night and couldn't find me for ten minutes. Ten minutes! She hadn't even set out to pick me up and was only calling to let me know she'd be on her way. When I walked into the flat at about the time she was supposed to leave the building, I thought she'd be glad she didn't have to make the journey all the way across town to get me. Boy, was I wrong.

"I'll go get him." I offered quickly, before she went into proper meltdown mode. I could have called Jacob at reception and asked him to let David know he was needed, but it was my chance to escape the confines of the flat for a few minutes. I was willing to take anything I got.

Ignoring the warning glare from Agnes, I slipped on my shoes and bolted out the door. Seriously, what mischief could I possibly get up to between the front door of the building and our flat?

I only took the stairs to kill time but the stars must have been aligned in my favour because, if I had taken the lift, I would have arrived at the entrance lobby straightaway. David always stood by the front door, blowing smoke at disapproving non-smokers who walked past him. I'm guessing he saw it as his act of defiance against Agnes, even though she was never there to witness his childishness. Coming down the stairway, my view on the ground floor was through a large wall of glass to the side of the entrance. It was the only reason I noticed the tall familiar figure making a beeline for my father.

A hundred alarm bells went off in my head at the sight of clenched fists at Paul's side. After what I'd seen on Saturday, I had a feeling whatever he planned on doing wasn't going to end well. And, again, it would be my fault for opening my big mouth.

"You're early," I yelled, bursting through the front door before Paul reached David.

Being fast on my feet had its benefits but I never thought one of them would be saving my father from getting thumped. David jumped at the shrill tone of my voice before turning to face the teenage boy who now stood about a meter away from him. He hadn't seen him approaching, but he'd had no reason to take any notice of him.

"Nora, who is this?" David glanced from my fake hundred watt smile to Paul's glowering face. "What's going on?"

Good question. I wished I knew too.

"Paul's my Physics lab partner. He promised he'd bring some notes over. I don't really understand the theory of relativity coursework we were given and he's good at breaking down stuff."

It was a blatant lie because my supposed lab partner wasn't holding a scrap of paper or a bag that would contain said notes. He could also have emailed them to me instead of showing up there. To his credit, Paul said nothing to refute my fib. Instead he relaxed his tightened muscles and nodded along, then extended a hand to David like he hadn't intended to knock him out a second ago.

"Good evening Mr Brice. It's really good to meet you."

David had no choice but to shake his hand.

"You realise you're still grounded, right?" He clearly wasn't buying my story or Paul's transformation into a well-mannered classmate. I didn't blame him; it must have looked to him like his presence had messed up our tryst. I couldn't really tell my father my body had a way of sensing when Paul was around and gravitating towards him. How crazy would that have sounded?

"Agnes is looking for you." I responded, knowing any mention of her would distract him.

"Oh."

A cloud of uncertainty passed over David's face. He knew he had to go but he carried on eyeing Paul, who suddenly looked quite shady to me in his dark jeans, scruffy sneakers and trademark T-shirt. Coursework or not, my father would rather I associated with boys who wore loafers or, at least, combed their hair. He finally sighed and shook his head, stubbing out his cigarette on the pavement. "Don't be too long coming up, okay? I'll take the stairs."

I almost felt guilty when he added that last bit. He was trying to buy me some time even though I didn't deserve his generosity, especially since I was clearly lying to his face.

"Thanks." I grazed his arm gently before he walked into the building, nodding at Jacob as he headed in the direction I'd come from.

Once he was out of sight, I turned and jabbed Paul in the chest with as much force as my small body could muster. "What the heck were you thinking? What were you going to do? Hit him till he admitted something you believe to be true?"

Paul didn't even have the courtesy to look apologetic about being there. Folding his arms across his chest, his gaze fluttered to my cheek and his frown returned. I'd washed my makeup off so the bruise was more obvious than it had been at the sports centre.

"It's not okay. You know that, right?"

Grunting, I rolled my eyes. "I already told you he never touched me. And if he was hitting me, do you think a plea from a boy he's never met would change his mind? It'd just piss him off even more. Or were you just going to punch him and walk off."

I was trying not to yell but it was a struggle.

Then, oddly, instead of trying to defend his presence the way I thought he would, Paul's frown disappeared and his shoulders slumped as he closed his eyes. It almost looked like he was trying to calm himself; like he was recalling a mechanism to quell the storm brewing inside him. Of all the good looking guys at school I'd ever ogled, why did I have to fall for one with anger issues?

"No," he opened his eyes. "I was going to try to talk some sense into him. I know he's not hitting you, Nora. It's your mother, isn't it?"

My astonishment must have shown on my face because he covered the space between us in seconds and brushed my cheek with the back of his hand. It was only then I felt the wetness on my face. Crap! When had tears started to fall?

"Please, don't," he pleaded in a whisper, making it sound like my tears were his fault as he placed his forehead on mine. "I didn't mean to upset you, I just...I don't know...I just want to make sure you're safe. I want to make sure this never happens again."

Strangely enough, for years, none of my friends had ever felt it was their place to question the bruises which occasionally marked my skin. I said nothing; they asked nothing. Our conversations circled around cute guys, hair dye and nail polish as we swept our real problems under imaginary rugs. Yet this boy who knew nothing about me and had no business caring about me was the one who felt the need to protect me.

His words only escalated my sobs. He made it seem so easy, like he could snap his fingers and take away the pain my mother caused whenever she fell into one of her moods. Like he could wave a wand and make all the medication she'd been taking work in a consistent pattern. Like his bright idea of talking to David would be the thing to make my father crawl out from under my mother's thumb and finally take some action which could help us all move on.

I don't think Agnes had intended to hurt me on Saturday, but like everything with her, things got out of hand. She flung stuff when her temper got the better of her. Anything she could get her hands on; plates, books, vases. She'd once tried to throw a chair at Dad but he was too fast for her. As always, her apology afterwards had been heartfelt.

"You can't always save me, Paul." I shook my head as I wiped my eyes and pulled away from him, remembering Jacob could see us from where he sat. "Some problems aren't so easy to sort out with words. And they definitely don't need to be tackled with these." I covered his long fingers with my hands and held them to my chest. "I know you said you only came to talk, but you should have seen your face a few minutes ago. You really frightened me."

"I'm sorry..." He looked like he meant it, with his drooping lips and those sad, sad eyes. Fighting a sudden desire to wrap my arms around him and stop him worrying about me, I dropped his hands and folded mine across my chest.

"It's kind of sweet that you came all the way over here to tell David off," I attempted lightening the mood with a coy smile but he didn't return it. Maybe it was too soon to revert to flirting but I wanted the conversation to be over so badly, I was willing to do anything it took.

Paul held my gaze as he took another step forward and whispered. "Nora, all you have to do is say the word and I will do everything in my power to stop this from happening again."

Okay, he was totally freaking me out with his intense stare. What part of leave-it-alone didn't he get? And how did he plan on stopping Agnes from getting out of hand again when we'd tried so hard to help her ourselves? It wasn't like he was going to...No way! He wouldn't dare! I stepped away from him as an image of a psych ward flashed in my head. He wouldn't!

"Promise me you won't try to do anything about this," I almost yelled the words at him. "You might not get it now but this is the way things have to be until David and I figure out a different way to handle things. Promise me, Paul!"

If I'd thought he looked sad before, I had been mistaken. Now he looked like it physically hurt him to accept what I was saying. Why couldn't he understand this wasn't his problem to sort out? The psych ward I'd pictured had become properly ingrained in my head. I did not want to hate him for taking an action he felt was in my best interest; especially when I knew that if he rang someone about Agnes, he'd probably be right to do so.

I didn't realise I had been holding my breath until a sigh escaped my lips at his nod.

"I promise," he added for clarity. "But you also have to promise me you'll let me know if you ever change your mind about this. I know you don't believe me, but I really can help."

Something about how he said the last sentence made me wonder what he thought he could do, but I didn't want to prolong the conversation so I nodded and promised I would. It wasn't likely I'd ever consent to my mother getting sectioned, but he didn't need to know that.

"I have to go." I'd been out there for too long already. Unless I wanted to risk adding another week or two to my incarceration, I had to head back up.

Paul nodded, looking past me and into the lobby at Jacob. "See you at school?"

"As always."

I wondered if he would notice I was lingering with the hope he'd do more than just say goodbye. When he carried on waiting for me to leave, I sighed and turned away.

Dammit! Why did I want to hold him so badly?

I'd barely taken two steps before Paul grabbed my wrist and spun me around.

"I'm sorry if this gets you in trouble."

I could feel Jacob's stare through the glass door, but I didn't pull away from Paul's kiss. Some things were worth risking more punishment.

His kiss was at the top of my list.
NINE

Paul

Nora Brice did strange things to me. Strange, strange things which felt so good, even though they should have driven me insane.

She made me long to alter her mother's mind so she would never touch her again. Dad always told me long term mind alterations were dangerous and not particularly reliable, so I'd never attempted anything of such grand proportions. Not that I'd ever had cause to consider it. Still, I was willing to try anything to change the situation Nora was in. If only she hadn't made me promise not to interfere.

She made me want to whack her father in the face for not protecting her like he should have done. Even if he didn't hit her, he was still a coward in my eyes. I didn't know the whole story, but I couldn't see any valid reason for him not to do more for her. Again, I'd promised not to get involved. Why the hell had I done that?

I gave up my relationship with Marlboro Lights because I knew they reminded her of her father. Quitting cold turkey was one of the most difficult feats I'd ever attempted, but I didn't want her to think about that part of her life when she was with me. Ever!

She made me accept it was okay to lie to my father, as long as he never found out about us.

I know, I said us.

A few days after the encounter outside her building, I found a note in my locker asking me to meet her at the back of the courthouse after school. She didn't sign the note but there was no one else it could have been from.

"Aren't you supposed to be grounded?" I asked when I joined her on the top step where I usually sat. I tried not to stare but she was dressed in a fitted green dress, which stopped just above her knees, and a plastic orchid clip held her hair away from her face. I'd gawked at her from a distance all day at school. Sitting quietly beside her was pure torture.

"We are going to make this work," she ignored my comment and plunged right into her mission.

"What does that mean?" The seriousness in her eyes told me all I needed to know, but I still had to ask.

"It means whatever we want it to mean. But most importantly, it means we are going to get over this madness about not being able to date anyone until we are a hundred."

Twenty-one for me, but it wasn't even going to be dating in the normal sense. Offering that piece of information to Nora wasn't going to help.

"And you presume I'd want to date you?"

I received a finger flick on my ear lobe. The pain was worth it for the smile that flickered on her lips.

Nora then pulled out a thick stack of paper from her bag and began to unfold it. It was a map. Not just any old map, a map of the city with same sized circles drawn around four locations.

"That's my flat, that's David's office and this one is for Agnes. This is school." She pointed at each corresponding circle as she spoke, the sombreness returning to her voice.

"Nora, what is this?"

"We just need to add a two mile radius around yours and we have a map of where we can go without worrying too much about people we know seeing us. Most kids from school live within the school's catchment area so they should be covered in the overlaps. I know this doesn't account for the odd chance of people seeing us, but it's a start."

For a few seconds, all I could do was look at her. Loopy beautiful Nora.

"It might sound bat crap crazy but we have to try something. I don't know about you but it's driving me insane seeing you every day at school and knowing our lives have to continue running in parallel. We can carry on being Paul and Nora, two people living separate lives in a big city with a wealth of possibilities, or we can use the city to our advantage. You want to give this a shot too, right?" Her voice faltered a little as she stared back at me.

What really pissed me off was I should have been the one with the map, the one with the crazy plan, the one who was trying to make us work, in spite of everything. Yet all I'd done was dream about her every day and only allow a stolen moment or two between us. Seeing her at school was becoming unbearable but, for her to resort to drawing circles on a map, she clearly wanted us to happen even more than I did.

And I'd thought I'd wanted her really badly.

I knew whatever we started couldn't possibly last, not with my unmentionable abilities and forced fatherhood looming in five years' time, but I was willing to take what we got for however long we got it. Even if we couldn't have a future together, I would have the memories of our time together to hold on to when the time came for me to move on. I wasn't sure why, but I knew I needed to have those memories.

There was no denying it; we were in a hell of a lot of trouble.

"You know it'll take more than two mile radiuses plotted on a map for this to work." I held her gaze so she would understand the gravity of what we would attempt. "There'll be a lot of lying. And not just to your parents, but to everyone you know. Your friends..."

"I know." Her hand touched mine as her face softened into a smile. She didn't need to offer any more speeches to convince me.

"Alright then, this is where I live." I took the pen and drew a similar sized circle around my flat. "Dad works all around the city but most of his jobs are here and here."

I was probably making the biggest mistake of my life but, like I said, Nora Brice did strange things to me.
TEN

Nora

I couldn't believe I'd been sneaking around with Paul for eleven weeks and nobody had said anything. I guess we must have been really good at pretending. Or everyone knew what we were doing and hadn't ratted us out because they simply didn't care. As the excuses I made up to avoid spending time with Theresa and Stacey became increasingly ridiculous, I was more convinced the latter was true.

How many times could a girl suffer from gut-wrenching cramps in a month? Or attend hours of training when there were no meets lined up until autumn? Worst of all, I was pretty sure all my clothes had a lingering scent of teenage boy on them. Yep, there is such a thing. Nope, it doesn't actually smell as gross as it sounds.

David and Agnes didn't seem to notice the changes either. As surprising as it sounds, thanks to eight years of good behaviour, they'd (sort of) grown to trust me to be honest about my whereabouts. They would have assumed I was preoccupied with end of year exams as the term drew to a close. And when the summer holiday started, they had no reason to question the hours I spent out with my girlfriends. I hung out with them all the time so what was there to be suspicious about?

There was one thing they should have noticed though. I was happy. Not just happy, but giddy happy. Crack up laughing on the street happy. Not that I wasn't happy before Paul, it's just, I hadn't realised how guarded I'd been all those years, not being able to truly be myself with someone. I knew he didn't like to talk about my parents, I didn't either, but at least when I needed to vent, he listened. I wish I'd known how amazing it would feel to finally let out some of the emotions I'd been holding in for so long.

The map idea had sounded a tad bit desperate and insane, even to me, but it actually worked. When Paul hadn't taken one look at it, turned and run as fast as he could, I knew he wanted us to work as much as I needed us to. He'd even helped me refine it a little, suggesting a few other nodes to avoid as the weeks went by. Having restrictions on where we could meet turned out to be a warped blessing. Neither of us had explored the city past the circles we'd drawn, so hopping on buses and meeting at the other end of the city became a roundabout kind of adventure.

Who knew there were so many obscure yet brilliant places lurking at the fringes of our little world? On our first week of roaming, we stumbled upon a cheap venue which held open mike nights for bands. Paul fell in love with the place the second he saw the line-up. Not long after, I found a street market for local artists and dragged him along every Saturday afternoon.

Then there was the skateboarders' rink at the bottom of a bridge where we went to watch kids fly into the air and occasionally break their jaws. The athlete in me was drawn to it, although I could tell Paul didn't really enjoy going there. He grimaced every time we approached the bridge. He insisted it was okay whenever I suggested we go, but I could tell he spaced out like I did at the gigs we attended. Then again, he tended to space out a lot more than I did.

Parks were great locations too. With dozens and dozens to choose from, we would find a good spot under a tree and never worry about any of the other loungers taking any notice of us. Unlike music venues and markets, an hour felt like a day in the tranquil solitude of a green space. Parks were definitely my favourite spots to hang out.

My number one favourite thing? The way Paul always held on to me, like letting go would be the most painful thing imaginable. And his lips. I am not obsessed with kissing (maybe I am a little), but if someone was handing out awards for those, he'd win. Every single time. I know I might be coming across as dopey and overly into him, but it wasn't really like that. Those weeks with him were kind of difficult to explain. No one had ever made me feel as content and as cherished as he did. Not even my parents.

Sometimes, when I thought of how much I craved the warm cushion of his affection, a knot would twist away in my gut and wrench the wind out of me. How could the thought of losing one person fill me with so much dread? I wasn't foolish about the future. I knew our summer romance might not survive the fast approaching school term, or he might get bored with me if some other more appealing distraction came along. That was what scared me the most. Not the thought of being caught, but thinking I could lose him to someone else.

Whenever I felt that way, all I had to do was look into his eyes and any looming fears would melt away. He wasn't going anywhere, yet. I might as well enjoy our time together as much as I could, before things changed.

The summer wasn't completely scare-free. We had our first dicey moment when Paul spotted his father coming out of a house as we strolled out of a park. Our hands automatically unlinked as we turned and headed in opposite directions, our heads hung so low, they were practically tucked into our armpits. Turns out he'd been called out of his usual work zone to fix a fallen shelf for an elderly client.

And then there was the day I told David I was out with Theresa and she'd called the house because I wasn't picking up my phone. Or the day I was certain I'd seen Cheung by a stall at the street market, but he hadn't said anything to Paul so I must have been mistaken. Other than those few near misses, our summer was pretty much perfect.

Until the day my world turned upside down.

We were lying side by side in a fairly secluded park; the air had started to turn chilly again and I was wearing Paul's jacket. He claimed he didn't feel the cold as much as I did but the goose bumps sprouting on his exposed arms told a different story, so I slowly rubbed my hands up and down his arm to keep him warm. I hadn't helped much by blowing a raspberry on his belly earlier on. He'd laughed and pecked my nose but I'd noticed him shudder. We should have given up on the park and gone to one of our indoor hideouts but the sun was still putting up a good fight and it felt like we'd be betraying its persistence if we abandoned it.

When I felt Paul freeze under my touch, I didn't think much of it until he scrambled up and stared past me with a mixture of what looked like horror and shame.

Please, God, no!

My first thought was that we had been caught. I was terrified that if I followed his gaze, I would find my father, or his, glaring at us. Worse still, Agnes. That was why I took much longer than I should have to sit up and turn around.

No Agnes. No David. No Mr Colt.

In fact, because of the drop in temperature, we were alone apart from two other brave couples who were much older than us. They were clearly not interested in anything we had to offer. A little way off, a heavyset guy sat on a bench. He could have been in his late teens or early twenties, I couldn't tell from that distance. Nothing odd about him either, he wasn't even looking at us. But Paul couldn't take his eyes off him.

"What's wrong?" I had to ask because Paul wasn't offering any explanation for his unusual behaviour.

"Promise me you'll never leave me."

That wasn't what I had expected him to say, yet I sensed his distress wasn't one to laugh off.

"Why would you even ..."

"Please, Nora, just promise me." The desperation in his eyes was chilling as he shifted his gaze from the guy on the bench back to me.

I subconsciously reached for the green angel charm he'd bought for me as an addition to my bracelet. He'd jokingly said that if I wore it, he'd be with me all the time. Cheesy, but sweet. I almost never took it off. That thought was all the confirmation I needed to answer him.

Taking a deep breath, I placed a hand on his lightly stubbly cheek to ensure his gaze didn't wander. "I will never leave you. Not even if my heart stops beating. Because I'll always be here," my hand dropped to hover over his heart, "and here." My other hand moved to his temple.

The smile that wiped away his frown gave me hope I'd said the right thing. And I meant every word of it, with all my heart. I'd never been more certain of anything before. Saying it out loud somehow grounded what I'd felt all summer.

Judging by the next thing he said, my words had been too convincing.

"Then run away with me."
ELEVEN

Paul

"What?" The word came out in a drawn breath.

"Run away with me."

Those weren't the words which formed in my head but they were the ones I repeated to the startled girl in front of me. My eyes left her face and settled on the man once again. He still wasn't looking our way but I knew what he was; who he was.

"I don't understand."

How could I explain the sudden stifling sense of loss that came over me when I looked his way? The awful feeling I was going to lose her because of him. Nora had only been in my life for a few weeks, yet I couldn't bear to think of spending a day without her. On the few days I didn't see her, all that kept me going was daydreaming about when we'd meet again. How could this incredibly ordinary moment be the beginning of the end for us? We didn't have a forever future, but I'd thought we'd have more time to adjust to our inevitable fate.

The vibes I was reading off the Averter on the bench were shocking for two reasons; firstly, I shouldn't have been able to read anything off him at all. Secondly, the intensity of what he was emitting was off the charts. Like, super intense. Worse than any pulse I'd felt whenever a vision hit me. I shouldn't even have been able to tell he was there for Nora, and yet I knew.

Our summer had been too good to be true. I'd completely ignored Dad's warning about Averters not getting to fall in love, or at least not having the liberty to express how we felt. I'd more than expressed my feelings for Nora all summer. Balance had to be restored. That had to be the only reason I could sense her Averter's intentions. Because whatever he was there to fix involved me.

But I wasn't ready to give up on Nora. Despite the fact I had kept the truth about my abilities from her, she knew me more than anyone else ever had. Whenever something pissed me off, she always calmed me down without making it obvious she was soothing me. I don't think I'd thought about punching anyone in weeks, all because of her. And she sounded genuinely interested in what I thought whenever I had a rant about something.

She was clearly benefiting from having me in her life too. She finally had someone to talk to about the awkwardness that was her family life. Not that she brought it up a lot, but when she wanted to share, I could tell my attention made a difference.

She needed me.

I needed her.

"I know it sounds a little crazy and fast, but we can leave this place, do whatever we want, go wherever we want. We won't have to hide anymore. And it won't be like the last time you tried. I'll make sure we don't get caught."

"A little crazy? Wait, you're not kidding, are you?" The confusion in her eyes had grown to trepidation. I didn't blame her for either of those emotions. I would have laughed if she'd suggested the same thing to me.

I wasn't just talking to convince her to run off with me. If what I feared was true and her Averter was there to change things between us, I needed to keep her preoccupied. She couldn't be in the middle of a conversation if he was going to carry out a successful mind jig. If she carried on talking, maybe we'd have a chance of leaving the park without anything happening.

"It's not like we haven't talked about it before."

Now she laughed. "No, Paul, we've joked about it. There's a huge difference. I can't just leave David alone with Agnes. And call me wacky but, I actually want to stick around, finish school then go to university. Besides, everyone will look for us. We won't get past the next town before they find us."

Desperation quickened my thought process. "I didn't say we'd have to be gone forever. Only for the rest of the summer. We've avoided talking about the huge cloud hanging over us all these weeks but we both know this might not last. If we take off for a while, if this summer is all we have, we'll know we'd have finished it on our terms. All we have to do is make it to somewhere out on the coast; no one will find us unless we want them to."

I was surprised at how much sense I was making. I didn't want to totally mess up her future. All I needed was to buy us some more time together. Maybe when we got back, her Averter would still have a chance to fix things. Surely, we were too good together for anything gruesome to come out of our relationship. Whatever he thought I was going to do to her couldn't be that bad. I knew my rationalisation of the situation was biased, but all I wanted was a few more weeks.

Nora hesitated, biting her lower lip and wrinkling her brows as she thought about what I'd said. I'd learned to read her expressions but I couldn't tell what she was thinking. Maybe I'd pushed too far, too hastily. My proposal sounded foolish and reckless, even to me, so I waited for her rejection.

"Agnes will worry."

That wasn't a no.

"She will still worry if you're here. Wouldn't you rather get grounded for one really big act which deserves getting punished for, instead of sticking around and taking the blame for a hundred little things you haven't done wrong?"

I hated myself for what I did next but, I was desperate. Touching a fading dark mark on her right arm, I bent my head and planted a light kiss on the bruise. She hadn't explained how or why she'd earned that one. It wasn't right she had to be in that position at all. I felt her shiver at the touch of my lips on her skin, the tension in her body visibly easing.

"And you're sure we won't get caught."

"We're good at not getting caught."

I was grinning then because I knew she was only stalling. My eyes flickered back to the guy on the bench. He was finally looking at us but he didn't seem alarmed. Why would he be? He hadn't heard a word of what I'd said to Nora.

"I have to tell someone, I can't just leave town and scare everyone." I pretty much had my answer. "Can I tell one of the girls? I'm sure Theresa suspects something's up anyway."

"Tell whoever you want, as long as you don't tell them where or when we're going." This time my lips met hers and she kissed me back with an intensity which was difficult to pull away from. It was time to lay the next shocker on her. "We have to leave today."

"What? Why? What's the rush?" Fear returned to her face as she pulled away. The kiss wasn't as effective as I'd hoped it would be.

I knew it would be the most difficult part of my plan to sell. "Think about it. We only have a few weeks left before school starts. If we don't leave now, we'll never go. You'll get home, take one look at Agnes and decide to stay."

"I won't..." she began to protest but I interrupted.

"This way, no one will have a chance to suspect anything because we won't spend weeks planning and acting out of the ordinary. Let's just grab a few things and go. It's four o'clock and nobody will be home. I have some money saved up, definitely enough for our train fares and a room. Whenever the cash runs out, we'll come back."

"I don't know."

"This will only work if we go now, you have to trust me."

I'd never considered pushing a thought into Nora's head before, but I was very tempted to do so. I had to shake my head to dispel the thought. I might not have been a shining example for Averters but I wasn't the kind of person who would mess with his girlfriend's mind to get her to agree with him. If Nora wasn't convinced about leaving, then I had to take a deep breath and leave her in the cruel hands of fate. Her Averter would probably do his thing before the day ended and we'd be over. Just like that. Done.

"Alright."

It took a second or two for her whisper to register.

"What?"

"Don't look so surprised," she said a little louder, smiling as she pulled me into a hug. "I said yes, Paul Colt." She chuckled as she pecked my cheek. "I'm not saying it doesn't feel rushed but if you think now is the time to go, I trust you. Let's do it. Climb every mountain, ford every stream..."

"Please don't say, follow every rainbow."

"...follow every rainbow." She pecked my other cheek. "As long as we're together, everything will be alright."

I should have been relieved by her words; instead a sense of guilt gripped me. She trusted me with every fibre of her being and I was lying to her. Lying so I could keep her close to me for how much longer? A few weeks? Months? What if I couldn't protect her? What if what I was about to do was exactly what her Averter was there to prevent? And I was dragging her right into damnation?

It was too late to start second guessing myself. Nora was slowly covering my face with pecks and I let myself drop the dark thoughts before they built into something I couldn't control.

For the first time in months, I walked her back to her building. Her Averter didn't follow us as we left the park, but I wasn't going to risk leaving her alone until I knew she was far away enough for his Orb not to work. Once I saw her disappear into the lift, I turned and headed home. The twenty minute journey had never felt longer and by the time I arrived at the flat, I'd worked out exactly what I needed to take with me. Underwear, a couple of shirts, jeans, toothbrush, my savings, my Orb...

"Are you okay, son?"

I hadn't expected Dad to be home when I unlocked the door and made a beeline for my room. The shock of seeing him on the sofa must have added to the strain on my face.

"Hey, I didn't think you'd be here." I tried to keep my voice even, hoping he couldn't read the anxiety which practically oozed out of me. "You're not working today?"

He frowned and got up, running his fingers through his tousled hair. "I am. I had a couple of hours between jobs so I came back to take a nap. I'll leave in ten minutes. You didn't answer my question."

He'd definitely noticed. "Yeah, I'm fine. It's nothing, really. I had a fight with Cheung and need some time to cool off." I knew he wouldn't believe me if I said nothing was bothering me.

Dad came over to where I lurked in the doorway and placed his hand on my shoulder. His frown hadn't shifted and I braced myself for the pearl of wisdom he was undoubtedly going to drop on me. "Listen, son, there's nothing wrong with trying to keep friends at school, but sometimes we have to break ties to be better at what we do. This kid doesn't sound good for your psyche and you know how important it is to maintain balance at all times. If this friendship isn't working out, walk away from it. It'll only distract you from your duty. There is nothing more important than that. Nothing."

To be fair to Dad, it wasn't the first time I'd used Cheung as a scapegoat when it came to my liaison with Nora. On the night I'd gone to her house to talk to her father, I'd come home pissed off and Cheung had been blamed. Then there had been one or two late night returns he'd supposedly been responsible for.

Dad was only trying to look out for me and, on any other day, I would have been thankful he cared enough to try to protect me from the distractions of the world. But it wasn't any other day. I was already rattled by the appearance of Nora's Averter and our haphazard plan to flee the city. At that moment, all I could hear was the two-facedness of my father's words.

Darren Colt, the hypocrite. Preaching balance and self-preservation when he had no intention of breaking ties with his precious Mrs Steelton. A few years back, I had been excited when he applied for a passport for me because we hardly ever went on holidays. After letting myself daydream about a fun family trip outside the country, I was baffled when no travel plans were mentioned that summer. I only figured out why he'd bothered to get the document when I overheard Mrs Steelton's husband talking about his failed plans to emigrate to Australia with his family.

My father had actually considered uprooting us to follow a woman he was in love with halfway across the world. A woman who probably had no idea how he felt. And now he was asking me to walk away from a friendship because I had a few disagreements with Cheung? What the hell was wrong with him?

"I know, Dad." I couldn't look at him when I responded. "I'll keep away from him from now on. It's clearly not meant to be."

"Good." He turned to go back into the living room where he'd dumped his box of tools. "I have to get ready. There's a plate of food in the fridge for you, just in case you get hungry before I get back."

Despite my anger towards him, because I had no idea when next I'd see my father after he walked out of the room, I reached out and hugged him. It was an awkward embrace because he wasn't quite facing me, but it was better that way. I was still mad enough not to want to look him in the eye.

"Thanks for everything Dad," I said, hoping he could tell I meant it, before I scurried away to my room, leaving him with no chance to reply.

I knew he wasn't good at handing emotional outbursts so there was no question of him coming after me to ask why I'd suddenly decided to turn into a sappy arse. I waited in my room until I heard the front door shut before rushing to my wardrobe and grabbing a duffel bag. Stuffing as many items into it as I could, I searched around in my underwear drawer for the rolled up sock which held all my money. It wasn't a lot but we weren't planning on staying away for too long. Besides, like Nora feared, the authorities would probably catch up with us before we made it out of the borough.

Next, I went to Dad's room and rifled through his wardrobe until I found the box where he kept our passports. I wasn't planning on leaving the country but, other than my school card, it was the only form of ID I had. The passports weren't the only things in the box; there was a wad of cash beside them. It was a hell of a lot more than what I had in my pocket and I briefly considered slipping a few notes out of the roll. Dad probably wouldn't even notice they were gone.

As I was still trying to convince myself it wouldn't be stealing if I replaced the money when I got back, a small black pouch caught my eye. I'd seen it once before, many years ago when I came home and startled Dad as he sat staring into space with the pouch in his hand. Inside the soft fabric had been an Orb which he said belonged to my grandfather, a man I'd never met. All I'd heard about him was he'd died in a car accident not long after I had been born. One day, I would give his Orb to my son, just as mine would belong to someone else. That was the way things worked.

I stared at the pouch for a few seconds, before stuffing it into my pocket. Technically I wasn't stealing it; it was mine to take if it belonged to my offspring. I figured if anything happened to my Orb when I was away, it could be my backup. It wasn't like I wasn't going to return it when I got back. Taking both the Orb and Dad's money seemed a bit excessive so I closed the box and left the room with only the pouch and my passport.

There was one last thing to do before I headed back to Nora's. It wouldn't be right if I left without giving Cheung some form of an explanation. Even though I didn't always act like it, our friendship was important to me and I didn't want to destroy what we had. If I blindsided him by disappearing, I wouldn't be able to look him in the eye when I returned.

"What's up, Pretty Boy," he recognised my landline number because I didn't own a mobile phone. Dad said there was no point wasting money on one until I was old enough to pay the bills. When I finally started making some money, I hadn't bothered getting one because I'd only ever ring Cheung or Dad. The landline was good enough for that. "Are you finally ready to come over and get annihilated by the game master?"

"I'm leaving town for a little while, Cheung." No point easing him into it.

The silence that followed wasn't unexpected.

"With Nora?"

Now that was unexpected.

"You knew?"

I heard him shut a door behind him and I imagined he'd gone to his room to get some privacy. "Of course I knew. You guys are good, but not that good. I saw you at a street market a few weeks ago but I kind of already knew by then. You practically glowed whenever you were in the same room by the end of term."

"Oh."

It made sense that I wouldn't have read anything off him since I was the one doing the lying. Damn it! Did that mean a lot more people knew about us? Had we just been kidding ourselves all summer?

"Hey, if I was dating Nora Brice, I'd walk around with her face printed on all my shirts. But I reckoned you guys aren't being public about it because she hasn't got parental consent or something."

If only he knew the half of it.

"Yeah, something like that. Sorry about not telling you, Cheung. I wanted to but...it's complicated." I felt worse knowing he'd known I was lying all along and hadn't thrown a hissy fit. He was a much better friend than I was because I'd have been upset if the roles were reversed.

"You'll make it up to me someday, maybe when I need to do some sneaking around of my own." I could hear the shrug in his voice. "I'm guessing your out of town plans aren't sanctioned either. Do you want me to cover for you? How long will you be gone for? Where are you heading?" Helping plan a real life escapade was evidently more exciting than trashing people with a control pad.

"If I told you, I'd have to kill you," I half joked. Truth was, even if I wanted to place that extra burden of knowledge on him, I had no clue where we were going.

Cheung must have been disappointed by my answer because he sounded a little more subdued when he spoke again. "I still plan on making out with Sandra before I draw my last breath, so I'll wait until you get back to hear all the details. And don't worry about your Dad, I'll check up on him. Who knows, I could finally start my transformation into becoming the new Pretty Boy. He won't even notice you're gone."

I was going to miss the joker, much more than he could ever imagine.

"Thanks Cheung. There'll have to be radio silence but I'll see you in a few weeks, okay? Take care of your Mum and don't do anything I won't do."

"You mean don't make out with hot girls in secret locations and then escape from the city for a few weeks? Got it. See you soon, Paul."

I left home shortly after and went back to Nora's, pressing the buzzer to her flat like we'd discussed. There was no sign of the guy from the park but my senses were still on high alert. What if he'd somehow found a way to get into the building and had already carried out her Aversion. He could have posed as a delivery man or found an open door at the back of the building or...

Get a grip, Paul.

Chances were he'd done what most other Averters would have done under the same circumstances. Wait for her to leave the building. If Nora hadn't decided to go on a short stroll within the last hour, she was safe. I would have to work on stopping myself from turning into a paranoid freak over the next few weeks.

When Nora appeared in the lobby a few minutes later, she was towing a much bigger bag than mine. She'd also changed into jeans and a grey jumper, probably because the temperature had dropped considerably. After seeing her in dresses all summer, I couldn't stop myself from gawking at the way the denim fabric clung to her hips. It occurred to me that running off with her would be one of the biggest tests of self-control I would ever face.

"I think we should take a cab," Nora announced with a notable measure of liveliness. She was clearly taking the prospects of our adventure better than I was. That might have been because she didn't have the impending shadow of an Averter to worry about.

"That's a terrible idea," I mumbled, forcing my eyes to meet hers as I took her bag and slung it over my shoulder.

"Everyone will expect us to take a train or a bus. A cab could buy us some time if it drops us off at a train station where they won't think to start searching from. And look what I packed for us." She reached over my shoulder, unzipped her bag and pulled out two black baseball caps. "The driver won't see our faces."

Plus, I could fix it so he wouldn't remember what he saw once he dropped us off.

"Okay, I take that back, it's not such a terrible idea."

"You forget I've done this before Mr I've-Got-A-Plan." She snuggled up to me, not bothered at all by the porter who was intently watching us. Baseball cap or not, he'd have no problem identifying me when the questions started flowing, but that didn't matter. "I can't believe we're doing this. Why am I not afraid? I should be totally freaked out, but I'm not."

For the second time that day, guilt ripped through me. It was frightening how much trust Nora had put in me. What if everything I was getting worked up about was in my head? What if the feeling I'd had at the park was a premonition about something else? The man I'd tagged as her Averter hadn't worn a neon sign around his neck with explicit details of what he intended to do. He hadn't even appeared to take any notice of us until just before we left.

And if he turned out to really be her Averter, taking her away before he could plant corrective thoughts in her mind went against everything I'd been taught. Wasn't I putting her in more danger just to gain a few more precious moments with her? If anything bad happened to her because of me...

But I wouldn't let anything happen to Nora, I just couldn't. I was going to do whatever I could to keep her safe, now and always. An image of Mrs Steelton flashed in my head and I cringed. Maybe I shouldn't have been too quick to judge my father when it came to his obsession.

"No one is ever going to hurt you again, Nora. I promise." It wasn't the answer to the question she'd asked but it was what I had to offer as I nuzzled her neck and inhaled her familiar fresh scent. I would have done anything to preserve the perfection of that moment as she raised her head to look into my eyes.

"Why do I believe you when you make promises I know you can't possibly keep?"

Because I meant to keep every sworn declaration I made to her. The only truth I couldn't reveal to her was the real reason we couldn't be together. Dad said it was something we could never do; he said people like her would never understand, would never even believe our kind existed. But Nora wasn't like everyone else. I could sense it in my gut. And my gut never lied.

Maybe, one day, I'd find the courage to tell her the truth.

Maybe.

"Let's go find that cab."
Want to learn more about Averters and their abilities? Keep reading for an excerpt from AVERSION, Book One of The Mentalist Series. Available digitally and in paperback.

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AVERSION

Book One of The Mentalist Series

ONE

My name is Gemma Green and I am an Averter. You're probably wondering what that means and why it is important for me to state that I am one. On the surface there is not much difference between me and most other fifteen year old girls, except for the fact that I have the ability to alter people's minds and stop them from carrying out actions that will unhinge their predestined life paths. I know it sounds impossible but trust me, it's true. Only another Averter will be able to tell what I am from sight. Well, not really sight. We have the ability to sense things that others overlook. For example, I always know when I'm being lied to. I can't tell what the exact lie is but I get a knot in my stomach every time I hear one; the bigger the lie, the tighter the knot. It's clearly not the most enjoyable ability for anyone to have but the older we get, the easier it becomes to tune the feelings out. You eventually get to a point where the only person's emotions you can tune into is the person you are assigned to. But I'll get to that later.

I live in a town called Sandes where my Dad works as a handyman and I go to school with all the normal kids. Dad's job is convenient because he is his own boss and we can leave town whenever we have to without raising too much suspicion. You can only stay in a town for four years, tailing the people you are assigned to, before you have to move on to another location. That way we don't get too attached to anyone and people also don't figure out what is happening to them. All Averters with young children have to live in small towns so that they can teach their children to master their abilities in a controlled environment. Imagine having to grow up in a city with millions of people throwing out millions of vibes all the time. Only adults who have mastered their craft could survive the surge.

The other tiny little thing is, according to my Dad, I am a bit of an anomaly as I am the only known female Averter that exists. I don't know why but our kind have always been men. Our lives are pretty much dictated from the start; a male baby is born from a union between a chosen woman and an Averter. The child is cared for by his mother for a year then handed over to the father, never to see his mother again. The father teaches him his responsibilities and at the age of twenty one, the son must carry on the tradition of our kind by creating a child with a chosen woman. That's our circle of life. Son begets son begets son, until there was me. Dad knew being a girl would make my future as an Averter different but as he wasn't sure how things would work out for me, he decided to bring me up exactly as his father brought him up. Study, study, study.

Once I had accepted all that I was meant to be, I realised that frivolous fancies and silly romantic notions were for the girls in my school and not for me. Why think about make-up and boys and all that nonsense when I knew that I had only four years to live in a town and that the clock to my age of motherhood was ticking? The way I saw it, if I couldn't have the life that they had, the freedom to choose what to do with my life, there was no point pining for it. It would have been as dumb as craving chocolate milkshake when you're allergic to cocoa. Plain stupid when my future was practically set in stone.

But then I had my first real jolt. Not the sensation I already mentioned that we feel when people are being dishonest. No, the jolts are much more than that. They are what you get when you sense that someone is going to do something really bad pretty soon. Like drink driving their father's car into the path of a truck, killing two passenger friends and ending a very promising tennis career. I had never felt anything so strong and so horrible before but that was what I sensed when I walked past Russ that Friday afternoon after our English lesson. Dad said that you know the people you are assigned to by the fact that you get these jolts from them. Everyone else is white noise, that person becomes real to you. Russ was my first.

Internally, I felt sick but somehow I barely flinched at the visual I had. Dad had prepared me well for that day. I was to let him know once I felt it and we would perform my first Aversion. Once I stopped Russ from going to the party, our bond would be sealed and I would be able to sense his irrational decisions without being in the same room as him. Most of Dad's people were his handyman job clients and so it was easy for him to avert them without anyone thinking that their meetings were out of the ordinary. Fortunately, we are not obliged to avert every single bad decision people make, only the ones that call out to us. If you're lucky, you only get to carry out an Aversion on someone once in your time with them.

That night, Dad and I waited on a bench across the street from Russ's family home. Dad was assigned to a couple of people on the same street so he knew exactly where to sit to not get noticed. Russ's parents were away on business trips and he had agreed to be the designated driver for his friends. It was some popular girl's house party and everyone was going to be there, even though it was a school night. Everyone but me, of course. At fifteen Russ was too young to be driving but that never stopped anyone in our town. Rules applied only to people who cared about the rules.

"Ready, Gem?" Dad said when the light in the hallway went out and the front door swung open.

"As I'll ever be," I replied, trying to sound confident about my task. I was so nervous that I could have been sick at any moment but I held my head up high and rose with Dad. I had been waiting for this moment all my life and I knew exactly what was expected of me.

At first Russ didn't notice us as he got into the car and prepared to reverse out of the driveway. Dad and I positioned ourselves in the path of his car and he finally spotted us. I saw him frown in his rear-view mirror reflection and I wondered what he was thinking at that moment. He probably had no clue who I was, even though we sat in a few classes together at school. I had perfected the art of remaining inconspicuous. No friends meant no questions about my alternative life. Easier than having to lie about it to people.

"It's all you, Gem," Dad smiled at me for a brief second then turned to wave at Russ who carried on looking at us in the mirror, probably curious as to why we weren't moving out of the way.

I took a deep breath and walked over to Russ's window, lowering my head to the same level as his face. Despite my common sense, I could see what half the girls in my year went on about when I overheard them going on about how cute he was. He had an appealing mix of his mother's Persian features and his father's athletic build. His dark eyes were wide and expressed his confusion, yet he said nothing. Funny how I had never noticed his eyes before; right then it felt like they were trying to bore holes through me. At least he was cautious enough not to wind down the window. But the glass only protected him physically. I didn't need to touch him for this to work. All I needed was eye contact and I had it.

Hello Russ. You will start to forget every word I say even as I speak. You will also forget that I was here tonight. There's no need to panic, going to the party is not an option. Do what you have to do to get out of it. Whatever happens tonight, do not get into this car again.

That should do it, I thought as I saw his pupils dilate ever so slightly and flash a pale blue shade before clearing up again. But then I remembered something else that I had thought about earlier on that afternoon after I had felt the jolt and realised that I'd have to see him again that night.

Oh and stop that filthy habit of smoking with Dean and those idiots at break. Seriously, tennis pro with tar coated lungs?

I stepped away from the car and walked back to where Dad was waiting behind the car. It was time to see if it had worked, if I had finally crossed the threshold between exceptionally perceptive human and Averter. At first nothing happened as Russ remained in the car with his head bent low.

"I blew it, didn't I?" I said with a sigh.

"Patience. You've just attempted to alter his psyche, give it a moment."

Almost on cue, the car door flew open and Russ got out. He didn't turn back to acknowledge us. Instead he walked into the house and shut the door. Lights went on inside as he found his way round the house and Dad motioned for us to return to our waiting area. We had to make sure that he wasn't going to convince himself that the party was still a good place to be at. Dad said that sometimes it didn't matter what we tried to achieve, strong will power had been known to be the cause of failed Aversion attempts, especially when the subject was young and feisty. But the front door remained shut and after about an hour, Dad indicated that it was time to go.

That was it. My first Aversion. It was that easy. I was finally going to receive my Orb, a vessel that helped channel the emotions of our assignees to us from a great distance. Receiving it would truly mark my graduation into the big leagues.

I was certain things had gone smoothly until the next day at school when I walked past Russ in the cafeteria. I usually kept my head down when there were a lot of people around but I couldn't help sneaking a peek at him. I was still slightly fascinated by the fact that I had altered his mind and he was supposed to have no recollection of it. He was sitting with his usual group of noisy friends, probably the same ones who would have died last night if it hadn't been for my little stunt, so I expected him to be engrossed in whatever they were saying. But when I looked up, he was staring at me. Not just a quick glance like I was attempting, but outright staring. I was so shocked by this that I looked away really quickly. Something didn't feel right. I thought I had detected a flicker of recognition in his eyes. But it couldn't be. He had no reason to stare at me. It could only mean one thing.

I ate my lunch as hurriedly as I could, left the cafeteria and headed for the girls' toilets where I locked myself in a cubicle and tried not to hyperventilate. Maybe I was overreacting. Maybe he hadn't even been looking at me. I suppressed the urge to ring Dad and tell him that I might have botched the Aversion. What could I have done wrong? He hadn't gone to the party so that part had clearly worked. Maybe I hadn't been strong enough when I told him not to remember anything about me being there. That could be why he thought he recognised me.

I couldn't hide in there for long, I had classes to attend and our school toilets didn't smell good enough to hang about in for more than a few minutes. When I emerged from the cubicle, I caught sight of my reflection in the large mirror above the washbasins and gasped. I looked like someone had smacked me across the face and was coming back to finish the job off. I wasn't usually superficial enough to notice what I looked like so for me to say that I looked bad, I really did look awful.

"Gemma?"

I had left the toilets and was walking to my next class when the sound of my name hit me in the gut. Please let this not be happening, I prayed silently as I turned round to face my addresser.

Sure enough it was Russ standing behind me, frowning like he had done last night and still looking incredibly cute. I had never let myself consider what the boys in my school looked like and yet for the second time in less than twenty four hours, I was struck by Russ's large dark eyes. Urgh, what was wrong with me? Think cocoa allergy, I scolded myself.

Even worse than that was the thought that I had definitely messed up my first Aversion. I had to have. Russ Tanner had never spoken to me before today and suddenly, there he was, calling my name right in front of everyone. Damn it. That probably meant that I was not going to receive my Orb today.
Other works by Kenechi Udogu (available digitally and in paperback)

Aversion: Book One of The Mentalist Series

For Gemma Green's first time, things should have been straightforward. Find your subject, hold their gaze and push a thought into their head to save them from future disaster – Aversion complete. A pretty simple process given that the subject was to have no recollection of the experience. But Russ Tanner doesn't seem to want to forget. In fact the more she tries to avoid him, the more he pushes to get to know her. Gemma knows she has a problem but is she facing the side effects of a failed Aversion or has the school's tennis champ really fallen for her?

Sentient: Book Two of The Mentalist Series

Mastering her Progressive Empath abilities isn't going as well as Gemma hoped. In fact, months after finding out what she really is, she still has no clue what this truly means. All she can do is wait to see if any new abilities will eventually manifest. Things aren't going great with Russ either. Unsure of how to handle her Sentient Link with him, she tries to integrate herself in his busy social life but struggles to adjust to her new circumstances.

When she is plagued by recurring nightmares, Gemma realises things are changing and knows she has to do something, fast. The arrival of two sets of strangers in town, both offering the much needed assistance she needs to unearth her powers, escalates the situation even further. Gemma attempts to decipher whose intentions are genuine, but does she have enough time to figure out who has her best interest at heart?

The Other Slipper

When Jo finds a lone glass slipper on the night of the royal ball, she realises that there is more to the seemingly ordinary object than meets the eye. Searching for its owner, she is led to the palace where the princess sets her on a journey that thrusts her into an unexpected world of magic and illusions. It soon becomes clear that there is a lot more to her mission as she discovers startling secrets about her past and struggles to embrace her destiny.

The Altercation of Vira

The people of Vira have long awaited the arrival of their lost princess, Elve. Legend has foretold a season of great change in the dawn of her return. For the Maracans, she brings the promise of fortified control over their rival kindred. For the Cefans, a glimmer of hope in an existence filled with oppression.

The only problem is their princess is eighteen year old Ama Brown, an ordinary girl living an ordinary life, who has no idea that she is about to be drawn into a world where an age old battle is brewing and nothing is quite as it seems.

The Summer of Brian

When Charlene Bowman's parents take on a teenage houseguest for a month, she doesn't expect much to change for her that summer. But Brian arrives early on a Saturday morning, handsome and confident, throwing Charlene's world into turmoil. Discovering he has a girlfriend, Charlene tries to appear sophisticated and makes up a nonexistent boyfriend. Too embarrassed to tell him the truth afterwards, she consults her best friend Orla who suggests they find a candidate to play the part. A search ensues and hope is found in Nathan, a boy in their year, who appears to need their help as much as they need his. Could Charlene be about to learn a lesson in life and love?

The Yam Po Club

Boarding school – a painful rite of passage which remains forever etched in memories long after the days of confinement are over. At least that's the impression Onyebuchi has been given by her older brother. The idea of leaving home is daunting, yet exciting, as she embarks on her first term at an all girls' boarding secondary school in Enugu. Onyebuchi soon makes friends with two girls who have just arrived from outside the country, Funke from the UK and Nnenna from the USA. Together, the girls navigate a series of trying experiences that will test the limits of their bond.  
Set in the early nineties, The Yam Po Club is a coming of age story about a group of girls who defy the odds to form a lasting friendship and survive the many trials of boarding school life.

