Fourteen

 

Conner

 

I can’t sleep.

Which is nothing new, really. Sleep has never been easy for me. Sometimes, I can go days at a time without so much as closing my eyes. That’s what happens when you have a brain that never stops working.

I started walking at nine-months-old. Able to carry complex conversations by the time I was a year and a half. I toilet trained myself by age one. Taught myself how to read by age three. My parents knew something was wrong with me when I began requesting books on quantum mechanics for Christmas at the age of four.

Yeah, I said wrong with me. Because, most of the time, that’s what it feels like. Like my 198IQ is a disease. Something that makes me different. Less human. Less real somehow.

The truth is, I graduated on-line high school, long before it was time for me to actually go, but I saw what Declan had—a normal life—and I wanted it. Even though I was already halfway through my first Bachelor’s degree, via online college, I told my parents that I thought attending high school at the appropriate age would help me develop socially and they agreed. Actually seemed relieved at the prospect.

After a meeting with the school board, and a sizable donation to the school’s library fund, they agreed to allow me to what basically amounts to pretend to be normal for the next four years. I go to school every day, I take tests. I turn in the occasional homework assignment. They get a bump in their standardized test scores and a brand-new library. I get to feel like I’m regular.

I get to feel real.

None of this is what I’m thinking about right now. Right now, I’m lying in the dark, thinking about Henley.

When I finally followed her up the stairs after our tutoring session, I found her sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of my bookcase, one open in her lap, several more spread out on the floor around her.

She doesn’t look up when I walk into the room. She wasn’t waiting for me. She doesn’t try to sit next to me. She doesn’t chatter or giggle or ask me a million questions like she’s interested in what I have to say. She doesn’t even know I’m there.

I sit on the floor, across the room from her, back against the side of my bed, and I watch her. The way she gnaws on her bottom lip when something she’s read makes her nervous. The way she leans into the book a little bit when she’s excited. The way she runs the end of her braid through her fingers when she’s concentrating. Watching her, being completely ignored by her, I’ve never felt more real in my life.

Eventually, my mom comes up to get us for dinner. I don’t know what she expected to find when she did, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t me sitting ten-feet away from Henley, watching her while she read.

“Time to wash up, you two,” she says, a weird smile aimed in my direction before she heads back downstairs.

Henley’s head jerks up at the sound of my mom’s voice, and she looks around like she can’t figure out where she is. Finally, her gaze falls on me. “What time is it?”

“Seven,” I say, stretching my legs out in front of me. “Seven-o-eight, to be exact.”

She looks down at the book in her lap. “I should go,” she says closing it reluctantly before setting it aside. “My dad is probably worried—”

I stand, crossing the room to stop in front of her. “You’re staying for dinner,” I tell her, offering her my hand. We both know her dad’s not worried. He doesn’t even know she’s gone.

She looks up at me, her freckled forehead crumpled slightly. “Is that right?”

“Yup.” I wiggle my fingers at her, laughing out loud when she slaps my hand away to stand on her own.

Holding the book in her hand tight against her chest like a shield, she looks up at me. “Our tutoring session is over, Conner Gilroy,” she says, her head tilted back so she can look me in the eye. “That means you no longer get to boss me around.”

“Huh. So, what you’re saying is…” I take a half step toward her, and she counters the move, bumping into the bookcase behind her when she does. “During our tutoring sessions, you have to do what I say.” Her wide eyes narrow slightly when I smirk at her. “Good to know,” I say, holding my position.

Her eyes go wide again, her mouth slightly open. “That’s not what I meant,” she finally manages.

“Sorry, Hennie,” I say, letting my mouth turn down at the corners. “No take backs.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Sorry,” I say, letting my gaze wander over her face. Her crooked nose. Her chipped front tooth. The constellation of freckles scattered across her cheeks. I don’t see imperfection. I see her. I like it. I could spend the next fifty years looking at her face and still find something new to see, every time I opened my eyes.

“No, you’re not.” She glares at me. Direct. Unflinching.

“Yeah,” I flash my dimples at her, giving her a crooked half smile. “I’m not.”

She shakes her head, short choppy swivels that barely register as movement. “You make me nervous,” she says baldly, frowning up at me. “I don’t understand you.”

Reaching out, I wrap my fingers around the book she’s holding and pull it from her hands. She lets it go, and her arms hover there for a moment before dropping awkwardly to hang at her sides.

I move closer, reaching past her to slide the book back into its space on the shelf. Hand still resting on its spine, arm angled over her shoulder, I look down at her. She’s looking up at me, her eyes wide. Unsure. Gaze settled on my ear. I could kiss her if I wanted to.

And I want to.

But I don’t. I can’t. Because she’s about two seconds away from bolting and if she leaves now, she’ll never come back.

And if that happens, if she never comes back, I don’t think I’ll ever feel this way again.

Real.

So, I tilt my head down and bring my mouth as close to her ear as I possibly can without touching her and do the only thing I can.

I tell her the truth.

“Same.”