Amara broke our concentration. “Oh my GOSH, stop STARING at each other! It’s freaking me out!” Tarik and I laughed. “It’s not our fault we got Telepathy.” “I know,” sighed Amara. Tarik looked at me again, his thoughts filling my head.

“So, Roslin, do you want to hang out on Saturday?” I smiled. “Sure. What will we do?” His thoughts darkened for a moment. A scene popped into my head. “Oh, I don’t know. Tell scary stories, walk through the elderflower fields, get so entranced with each other that you tell me you love me and I have to kiss you…”

“Seriously?” I gagged. “That’s nasty!” He chuckled. Amara chimed in again. “What? Why are you laughing? Did he make fun of me again?” She looked at me. “No, he told me he’d have to kiss me if I told him I loved him on Saturday.” We scrunched our noses. “Eeeeww!” The two of us giggled. I reached out my thoughts to Tarik’s blank mind.

“For reals though, are you serious? You want to kiss me?” Tarik cleared his throat. “I mean, every guy wants to kiss you. Have you SEEN yourself? You’re hot!” I snorted, blushing. “You don’t really think that’s true, do you? You’re just messing with me.”

Right?

For as long as I had known him, Tarik had been a tease. I never took him seriously, which sometimes caused problems, but we always made up and stayed friends. Why did this time feel different? It felt…more genuine, somehow. Not just a tease, but something else with a deeper meaning.

“Roslin. Are you okay? You blanked out.” Tarik’s gentle thoughts comforted me. “Yeah yeah, I’m fine. I’ll see you Saturday?” “Ye-“ Tarik’s thoughts were cut off. “Yeah, see you Saturday.” We turned. Amara looked up from her Teleparter at us, calmly.

Then she slapped a hand over her mouth. “Fizzleberry frosting,” she mumbled through her hand. “How did you know?” Tarik asked her. Amara hesitated. “I, I…” Tarik was getting impatient. “Well? How did you know, Amara?” She took a deep breath and started, slowly.

“I got Empatheti. I can read your emotions and the phrases that cause an emotional shift. That’s how I know. You feel love. I know because you’ve been thinking about Roslin all day, and that you’ve been thinking up new jokes to tell her, because you love the way the laughs. I know that Roslin is blushing right now, and she’s feeling embarrassed. She’s thinking about you. She wants to know if what you said before is true, because she’s had a crush on you for years and wants to know if you like her back.”

He turned to me. My stomach felt like it would explode with butterflies. How did she know that far back? It was true. That’s exactly what I was thinking about. “Well, the more you know,” Tarik chimed. I was sure that if I put a hand to my face, it would burst into flames. This was going to be interesting.

FINALLY PUBLISHING MY DRAFTS

3/06/22