5. FIGURED OUT

It took me a few seconds to notice that the thought came from Ashton. So one of his powers was to read minds, just like me. I noted that he didn’t know that I could read minds so I took him by surprise when I threw back a thought at him.

It didn’t take me long to figure it out though, I thought.

Lina? He asked.

Yeah, who else could it be? I asked.

Wow, so you can read minds huh? He tsk-ed in his mind.

Just like you, I answered.

But how? He asked, still surprised.

If it weren’t for the lesson and the teacher in front of the class having a good view on all of us, Ashton would have turned around to look me in the eye and see if he was really having a mental conversation with me.

Same way as you, I answered.

I saw Ms Ambleton asking him a question and Ashton answering, before it really happened. I was about to ask him about it when I heard her calling his name and asking the same question as the one  I heard in his mind. He answered it exactly as he did in his mind a few moments ago. In that instant, I discovered that he could predict the future.

I decided not to say or think anything else for the whole duration of the lesson. When the bell rang, I   took my books and stuffed them in the bag. I tossed my bag to my back and stood up to leave, but he was already there.

“Can we talk?” he asked.

“Not now. I’ve got to get to class”, I answered.

Before he said anything else, Mya and Brendan were already by my desk.

“Hi Mya”, he greeted her.

“Ashton”, she answered with a smile.

I remembered that Brendan wasn’t introduced to him so I took the liberty of doing so.

“Brendan, Ashton. Ashton, this is my friend Brendan”, I said with a hand swaying between them.

“Hello”, Brendan said, with his hand extended.

“Hi”, Ashton said, and they shook hands.

Oh wow, his hand is so smooth. I heard Brendan’s thoughts and I knew that Ashton heard it too. He looked at Brendan and raised an eyebrow when it seemed Brendan couldn’t let go of his hand.  Brendan noticed that and let go of his hand.

Umm, that was weird. Ashton thought to himself and I couldn’t help but giggle at that thought.

“Share the joke, Lina”, said Mya.

“It’s not a good one. I was just thinking of the show I was watching yesterday before I slept”, I lied swiftly.

“Oh”, she said.

We then started to move out of the class to go to the next one.

I decided to let Ashton know about my friend, Brendan.

Don’t think too much on it, but Brendan is kind of into guys, if you catch my drift.

You mean he’s gay? He asked me when I made a turn heading to the lockers.

You could say that.

Oh, thanks for the heads up. He headed in the opposite direction to where his locker was situated.

“Wow, Lina. He’s really cute!” exclaimed Brendan before he headed to his own locker.

Mya and I headed to our own lockers and she didn’t say anything all the way. I could tell though, that she was smitten with Ashton, just like Brendan.

The lockers area was populated with people getting books from their own lockers and it was pretty much noisy. Above all that noise, I could hear that most of the conversations evolved around Ashton Turner. Apparently, Isabel had noticed Ashton had stopped by my desk and talked to me so she was planning on going to tell him about my being a freak. I saw her eyeing me and I turned away from her. I collected my books and closed the locker. Mya noticed Isabel looking at me and decided to let me in on what she was talking about last night.

“Remember what I was telling you about last night?” she asked me.

“Yeah, what about it?”

“Well, apparently Ashton didn’t fancy her the way she was planning on it. You know that no guy has ever turned Isabel down before, so she took offence in that”, she said that when we walked off to our next class.

“Oh, ok. Is that why she’s looking so glum today?”

“Yes. But if you ask me, I’ll tell you that she’s planning her next move so that she can get to him”, she said.

“That sounds like Isabel, frankly, I wouldn’t really be surprised if she does that.”

“If I knew better, I’d say she’s thinking daggers towards you because Ashton actually talked to you and you smiled at each other”, she said that with a serious face.

“Hey, it’s not like I called him to come talk to me. And it’s not my fault that Ashton turned her down so she’ll just have to deal with it without involving me.”

She didn’t say anything until we arrived at the Science class.

I began on thinking about what Mya said. Isabel always got what she wanted because she’s a very beautiful chit. She has emerald green eyes and silver blond hair. She was a bit pale and had a pretty good bone structure. Most of her friends followed her around because of how much people liked her, for her looks though. I’d been in the same class with her from seventh grade and from then, we’ve never been friends or even close to that.

I took my seat at the back of the class and Mya’s seat was a few seats in front of me. Ashton entered the class with Michael Fords, one of the decent guys in my class. They were just having a normal conversation and I didn’t bother to pick up on what it was about. They took their seats that were closer to mine, Michael was seated between me and Ashton.

Before the teacher got to class, I decided to put on my conspicuous headsets so as not to hear all the humming from different people’s minds.