She sighed. "Fucking Harcourt. I'll be there in half an hour. Can you make it for that long?"
"I have to," I told her and hung up.
In the distance police sirens rang out, threatening my life and my livelihood. I closed my eyes, held my breath, and counted to ten as slowly as I could. That let me settle my nerves long enough to make a plan. Harcourt was too damned far to walk, especially if I was a wanted man. I couldn't steal a police car, though there were days when I had in the line of duty; the cops always understood in the end and we usually gave the car back.
No, I only had one option if I wanted to meet Cassie at the mall. But it meant blood, sweat, and tears from my end of it. Steeling myself, I looked up. Then I took off into the night sky and didn't look back.
Chapter 3
"Really, Cassandra, we raised you better than this."
My father finished his tirade and I looked at the ceiling, trying to keep from rolling my eyes. "I'm in my 30s, Dad. I really don't need your approval to do whatever the hell I want to do anymore."
"First it was that girl and you said you were some kind of homosexual. Now it’s all these boys and just, darling, what will people think of you? You're the only Clark left at the Yarborough unit and we just want you to look out for the family name."
He sat down across from my bed, blocking my way to the door. I'd been practicing all the mental shielding techniques I knew, but I was sure that I was missing out on something. He knew that I wanted to leave; he had to, and he was trying to prevent it.
That wasn't so much of the issue. I was going to get to Adam even if it meant knocking my dad on his ass. Wouldn't that be great? It was the first time I'd spoken to them in years and one of the things I was about to do was chuck Dad on the ground and go running out over him. It showed all that family team spirit that I was just bursting with. "Dad, I'm bi. We went over this when I was 14. I don't care if you like it. I don't care if you like this. And I don't care about the family name. I'm a Blitzer. I don't represent the family anyway."
Mom threw her hand to her chest like she was in an soap opera, absolutely horrified at my revelations. Which, of course, weren't revelations at all. I'd been the same person since I was a teenager and it wasn't my fault if my parents were just discovering that I was serious.
"We can't possibly allow you to go running around like this. You'll stay here in recovery, especially while we get those psychic powers under control," Mom said, all but floating over to me. She took my hands in hers and continued. "And you can settle on one of these nice young boys you've come to like so much. Not the Reed boy, of course. But perhaps the doctor, now, he'd make a perfectly fine catch."
"Nate's a nurse and part-time EMT, Mom. He's not a doc-"
"Close enough," she snapped.
That time, I did roll my eyes. "It's a completely different thing and what you want doesn't really bother me. I'm leaving within the next ten minutes one way or another. I'll submit myself for whatever psychic bullshittery you people want to put me through after I get back, but we all know I'm not one of you."
But God, I wanted to be. There was a flicker of hope that just wouldn't die. What if I had finally Awakened? What if I was on my way to becoming the greatest Psychic superhero that had ever lived? Finally, I'd be worthy of my family. I'd be worthy of being a -Clark-, and maybe I'd get some stuff changed around here.
If I really were a Psychic, shouldn't I have been able to pull myself out of the Dream?
I didn't dare ask that question. If my parents figured out that they were wrong, they'd probably go back to practically shunning me again. And though I was loathe to admit it, it was incredibly nice to have their attention even if it was just for a little while. I hadn't had any other siblings, but they'd always found other ways to shuttle me off to the side when I'd been a kid. They'd mentored my cousins and other Psychic kids that turned up. They had found ways to tell me that I hadn't mattered as much as other things.
Yes, there'd always been food on the table. I'd always had clothes on my back. But it was a benevolent sort of neglect that haunted me throughout my early years and had left me feeling a little bit jealous of those cousins when I was around them.
Allison hadn't been the worst, but she'd certainly been pretty far down my shitlist.
My phone rang again. I recognized Adam's ringtone and sighed, getting to my feet. "I'm sorry. I just have to go. I'll try to make it make sense in the near future."
And I walked out on my parents without another word.
If you've never done that, you don't know how anxious it makes you. When you're young, you get the feeling that your parents can move mountains. That's awe-inspiring, but also kind of terrifying. It's why kids hide things from their parents, avoid talking about stuff with them; because if they don't approve or if you really fucked up, you're pretty certain that you could have that mountain dropped on your fucking head.
I called a taxi to Harcourt Mall and arrived a scant few moments later.
