“We should start dating.”

While changing clothes after work, Ann was approached by her co-worker with that sentence. She looked at her co-worker in confusion. Part of it was because of her sudden approach. However, she was also confused because it was true that she had a crush on her since the first week they started working together.

Ann Banks worked as a saleswoman in a big clothing store in the capital. For her, it was more like a temporary job to pay for college, although she took it very seriously.

She was a tall blonde with fair skin and light blue eyes. Because of her voluptuous body, she was the favorite between the male customers who went there. Which was a problem, as she has only liked girls since high school.

But that was a secret. No one else knew about her preferences. That’s why she was surprised by the sudden confession.

Her co-worker’s name is Marina Villa. She was a woman with dark, black and wavy hair and olive skin. She had dark black eyes and was a little shorter than Ann. Ann didn’t find Marina particularly attractive. Even though her black and lustrous hair was beautiful and caught everyone’s eyes, her face and body were average. But more importantly, she never smiled. Even if it was something so important in her line work, she had a serious face most of the time she was talking with customers. And yet, every single person she helped ended up buying something, most times more than what they were planning to. For that reason, the store’s manager stopped asking her to smile more.

For Ann, Marina just caught her attention since the very first day they started working together. She reminded Ann of an ex-girlfriend she had in high school. And even if her looks were average, Ann still found her pretty. Although even she thought Marina would be prettier if she smiled more since her serious behavior was captivating. Marina was always jumping to help when any of her co-workers had a problem, and she always had the answer for anything. In Ann’s eyes, Marina was the coolest woman she ever met. So it wasn’t a surprise that she fell more and more in love with her as they worked together. And yet…

“W-What?” Was all that Ann could say.

“I said we should start dating,” Marina said, with the same serious face. She seemed to analyze Ann’s face for a moment before she explained herself. “You might not believe it, but I can read minds. So, I already know you’re interested in me. You might wanna play hard to get, but that’s useless as I already know how you feel. So just say yes already.”

“Yes…” Ann said, almost on automatic, but then backed out. “Wait, wait, wait! Do you want me just to believe that?”

“What do you want? A proof?”

“Y-Yes, actually,” Ann paused in a reflective silence before saying: “If you really can read minds, then you can guess the number I’m thinking right now, right?”

Marina looked at Ann, who felt her face getting hot from being exposed to those intense black eyes.

“Well,” Marina said, as calm as before. “You’re thinking a lot of things, right now, which is understandable. I can see the number 153 among all that, though. Is that it?”

“I...Yeah…” Ann had to admit that Marina was telling the truth. That wasn’t something she could just guess.

If she can read minds, does that means she could hear everything I was thinking? Ann thought. When I was checking her out. When I thought I wanted to kiss her. When I imagined how she would look like wearing the lingerie she was selling. When I caressed her hair while she was napping during lunch time.

“I couldn't know about the last one. I was sleeping.”

Ann hid her face on her hands. Of course, everyone naturally thinks that the inside their mind is a safe space. Knowing how Marina could hear everything she was thinking, Ann feared that she must’ve looked like a pervert.

“Not at all,” Marina said and gently pulled Ann’s hands off her face.

She brought her own face close to Ann and gave her a soft kiss on the lips. Marina let shown the rare sight of a faint smile.

“When it’s you, I don’t mind. That’s why I don’t mind dating you.”

“Y-Yes,” Ann said again, feeling her heart skipping with the sweet aroma of Marina’s perfume so close to her. She could still feel Marina’s soft lips on her.

“That’s good, then. From today on, we’re dating,” Marina said and walked away. As she placed her hand on the door’s knob, Ann grabbed her arm.

“W-Wait! Don’t you want my phone number or something? How can we keep contact?”

It was Saturday, so Ann knew they had the day off next day. She was hoping for at least a first date now that they were dating, but didn’t voice it.

“I already have it,” Marina said and Ann made a confused face. Marina smiled again. “At least once per week, some guy asks for your number, right? Even though you always refuse, the number always shows up on your mind when they do it. In fact, it happened just know. So I noted it already. I hope you don’t mind… Well, of course, you don’t.”

Ann let go of Marina’s arm.

“S-So, call me later, then.”

“I will. I’ll just let you process it all better. I can see you’re still confused.”

“G-Goodbye then.”

Ann stayed there. A wish crossed her mind and she wondered if Marina could hear it. Marina gave another smile, a rare sight which was becoming more common. She touched Ann’s face and gave her another kiss before getting out.

Yeah, I’m so confused right now.

But also so happy.

I hope she can feel that.

***

Ann was waiting in the park after 9 PM as promised. Last night, Marina had finally called and invited her on a proper date. Ann, of course, gave an excited yes, wondering if Marina could feel how happy she was over the phone.

She put a mini-skirt and a blouse that showed her shoulders. Ann didn’t know anything about Marina’s preferences, but that was how her ex-girlfriend liked to see her. She also had her makeup done, but that was a given all the time, even during work. Of course, despite her current insecurities with her style, she was pretty confident that she was pretty overall, as always.

She was nervous with the first date since that was just her second experience with love. Her ex-girlfriend was all the reference she had about other girls tastes. And her girlfriend had said herself how that wasn’t something that would work for every girl.

I wish I could read minds, she thought.

When Ann saw Marina walking towards her, she felt like an idiot. Of course, she would know everything about Ann’s preferences.

Marina was wearing black shorts and black leggings covering her whole legs. Of course, she probably knew how Ann always found the legs to be the sexiest part of a woman’s body. She was also wearing a black vest, giving her a cool look. Again, exactly according to Ann’s preferences.

Ann wondered if Marina was internally laughing at her bewilderment as she approached, hugged her and gave her a kiss. Again, just what Ann wanted.

“Did you wait much? I see. I’m happy for that… So, what should we do today?... Oh yeah, that’s a nice place, but I know somewhere better. The food there is good. How about a movie, too?... Oh yeah, I wanted to watch that one, too.”

Ann put her hand on Marina’s mouth, shutting her up.

“I know you don’t need me to, but that’s a little weird, so please, let me speak, ok?”

Marina laughed.

***

Despite Ann’s thoughts, Marina took her to a small restaurant, nice and cozy. They got an isolated table away from everyone else. So they could have a nice talk with nobody to bother them. Ann couldn’t stop worrying about how expensive the place looked.

“So that’s what you get for being a perfect saleswoman?” Ann said since Marina offered to pay the dinner for them both.

“I also live alone. Well, you too.”

“Yeah, about that. I know you don’t need to learn more about me at this point. But I do want to know more about you. Since we’re dating and all, and, you know, I can’t read minds.”

Marina giggled.

“What is there to know? I live alone because I can’t stand dealing with so much noise from other people’s thoughts. And I had to earn a living if I wanted to keep that. So I choose sales because, well, I don’t have to explain that. You get it.”

Ann took a bite from the food in front of her. It was probably the best food she had for some time. She wasn’t used to that kind of restaurant.

“I’m happy that you liked it,” Marina said, taking a bite of her food herself. Ann had to admit it was a little uncomfortable having her brain probed all the time.

“How does that even work?” She asked. “Can you hear people’s thoughts with words? What about feelings? You seem to understand those as well.”

Marina stopped. She looked at Ann, who couldn’t look anywhere else, losing herself in Marina’s eyes.

“It’s hard to explain, actually. I guess it’s the same as every sense. How can you hear, or taste, or feel? You get this information by your five senses and your brain interpret it in a way you can understand, right? So I guess it’s the same. My brain takes the intent of your thoughts and interprets it in a way I can understand it. But that’s just what I think it is. I can’t prove it because it’s not like I ever told someone to study how my brain works,” she paused, realizing how involved in her explanation Ann was. “But yeah, I can hear words when you think words. With feelings, I can kind of hear them in my mind, I guess. But the thing with feelings is that they’re different with each person, so I still need to interpret them. For that, I have to know that person for some time, so I can understand what their feelings represent best. Do you understand?”

She didn’t. Marina seemed to realize Ann’s confusion

Without warning, she took Ann’s hand and planted a kiss on it. Ann felt embarrassed, as well as happy and excited.

“Like that,” Marina said. “I can hear a lot of your feelings now and I can understand what kind of feelings my action would bring. By keeping an eye on those, I can sort what those feelings mean. They’re always similar when they mean the same thing, although the intensity changes. Of course, that’s a little hard, so I mostly just let it go. I won’t try to understand someone’s feelings unless that person is important for me somehow,” Marina smiled before adding: “I know all about your feelings, though. At least fear, frustration, happiness, excitement. Any kind of feeling you could have during work.”

“Why me, though?” Ann asked. She couldn’t forget Marina’s smile. So rare before that she couldn’t help but crave it in her mind. “I’m sure I’m not the only person to ever fall in love with you, right?”

Marina stayed silent. Her plate was almost empty now. She took a sip of the wine in the glass in front of her.

“You say that,” she said. “But in your mind, you’re thinking ‘well, I know I’m that pretty’.”

“Ah, s-sorry,” Ann lowered her head, shy. “It’s not a lie, though.”

Marina smiled and let the glass with wine on the table.

“Well, I was born with this… this ability. I still can’t call it a gift. Can you understand how it is hearing everything inside other people’s mind? I can hear every single thought they think. Every single bad and egotistical thought. With time, I started to avoid them.”

“I can’t imagine.”

“But with you, that was different. Not even a single thought I saw in your head made me think less of you. Even when you’re at a weak moment and think something you shouldn’t, I still can understand you. Even if you’re a little too full of yourself at times, you never tried to think less of anyone. And when I realized you were in love with me…”

Marina looked at Ann with gentle eyes. Ann suddenly started to remember every thought she had about her, trying to find out if she thought anything she should be ashamed of.

“Can you image,” Marina said. “How it is hearing the thought of people sexually attracted to you? The kind of thing that crosses their minds. The disgusting things they want to do with you or want you doing with them? That’s why having male friends was even harder for me. Most of them just can’t stop having dirty thoughts, even if they act nice on the exterior. Sure, girls do that too. But those weren’t about me, usually. Most thoughts I would get from women were of jealousy or hate. Occasionally, some of them did think about me sexually. Funny enough, not all of them were lesbians. Some straight girls thought about that too.”

“I-I can see why,” Ann said, avoiding facing Marina. “But if I ever made you feel bad, I’m…”

“No, that’s the opposite,” Marina touched Ann’s hand. “When you thought about me romantically or sexually. It was, how should I say? Warm? I could feel that you really loved me. I mean, sure, I felt that about others already, but always mixed with some unpleasant thoughts. But with you, even with the dirty thoughts, you were thinking about my well being. Seeing me as a person.”

Ann tried to avoid looking directly at Marina, bringing the glass with wine to her mouth.

“For example, when you were thinking about licking me on the…” Marina started to say.

“That’s enough!” Ann shouted, then covered her mouth realizing the eyes turning to her. She drank another portion of wine and said in a lower voice: “I get it, I get it. So please, don’t say anything else.”

Marina laughed.

“One thing, though,” Marina looked right into Ann’s eyes. Ann found her piercing look hard to avoid. “I know you’re excited and I’m happy about that. But I’m not really comfortable with,” she avoided her eyes. “You know, sleeping together in the first date.”

“No, please,” Ann looked to the side, feeling her face getting hot. “Just ignore my stupid brain. It’s just that you’re so close and being so nice, so,” she tried to look at Marina, but turned her eyes to the table, instead. “Did I, gross you out?”

“Didn’t I say I don’t mind?” Marina said with a comforting smile. “I just don’t want you to feel disappointed, that’s all.”

“I’m not! I’m really happy right now.”

“Yeah, I know. Also excited. A little too much. And while I feel delighted by how much you like my smile, your face is way prettier than mine. But you know that already.”

“Ah,” Ann suddenly reminded her first impression of Marina’s appearance, which never actually went away. “I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s fine. I think I’m just average, too. And I’m self-aware since I know what other people think about my appearance all the time. While most guys always want to have sex even with average girls, they always find every single defect on their looks. Girls, of course, are even worse in that. That did bother me as a teenager, so I never tried to make friends with anyone at school.”

“That must’ve been hard,” Ann said, but also thought about how that was an experience she never had in general.

“Well, yeah, you can’t know,” Marina said smiling and Ann tried to apologize again, but Marina stopped her: “No, I’m not judging you. It’s the opposite. As a teenager, I thought being pretty was the most important, even if I didn’t want people paying attention to me. I know it doesn’t make sense. Maybe I thought being prettier would make people like me more, I don’t know. Like, actually like me. But that would probably be worse. So meeting you, huh,” Marina paused. Ann looked at her with anticipation. “Well, first time I saw you, I thought you were a bitch.”

“Ugh,” Ann felt it stronger than she thought. Marina gave a laugh.

“I’m sorry, but that was the truth. Couldn’t be different, really. The first thing you did was to evaluate everyone’s appearance. Then I realized you liked girls. And sometime after that, I realized you were in love with me. I kinda stopped caring about appearances. You were gorgeous, and you were in love with me. Truly in love. I just realized how complex love is.”

Hearing that, Ann couldn’t stop feeling guilty. Even though she did think that about Marina, she still felt attracted to her body. She didn’t find her ugly, even if she didn’t find her exceptionally pretty. But her love wasn’t as pure as Marina made it out to be.

“And that’s not a problem, really,” Marina said, making Ann curse herself for not being able to suppress her thoughts. “After all, in my eyes, you’re the prettiest woman I ever met. I just realized how there’s a lot more involved in these kinds of feelings.”

“So you still don’t know everything,” Ann said with a timid smile.

“I was just a teenager at the time. You can’t understand how scary it is for a young girl to be able to hear other people’s minds. But now I’m fine. I’m used to it,” she emptied her glass, not bothering to fill it again and pointed her fork to Ann. “How about we play a game?”

“A game?”

“Well, not really a game. More like a diversion. I can tell you what’s inside other people’s minds in this restaurant.”

“That does sound interesting,” Ann said, looking at the people around them. The place wasn’t packed, but it also wasn’t empty.

“That guy, for example,” Marina pointed to a waiter with her head. The same waiter who brought their food. “He’s gay.”

“What? Really?”

“Yeah. He also realized we’re a couple. That gave him a little courage to confess to the co-work he’s in love with. But he gave up already.”

“That’s a little sad. Can’t we help him?” Ann asked, but Marina shrugged. “Oh, and how about his co-work? Does he like him?”

“Hum,” Marina stopped, looking at another waiter walking through the place. “Hard to say. He has some homophobic thoughts, which should mean our gay friend has no chance. However, he does think his co-work is cute. He hates himself a lot every time he thinks that.”

“So he’s in denial?” Ann asked, a flash of her own teenager years crossing her mind.

“I see you’re experienced in that.”

“I was twelve, ok?! And I was dealing with the fact that my friend was looking, like, really hot for me. I started to think ‘no way, lesbians are gross, I’m just a normal girl’.”

“Then she confessed to you.”

“Yeah,” the face of her ex-girlfriend crossed Ann’s mind and she smiled. “We dated for three years. It didn’t work out after all, but it was a good time. We became friends after we break-up, but I don’t see her for more than two years, now.”

“And I remind you of her.”

Ann looked at Marina. She had her intense eyes on Ann.

“Huh,” Ann said, trying to look away. “Can I ask if you’re jealous right now?”

Marina threw her body back and laughed.

“No, of course not. I can see you really loved her and thinks of her fondly now, but you see her as a friend only. It makes me happy to know that you had such a good relationship. But I’m the only one in your heart right now, right?”

Ann blushed and pretended to look at the other people in the restaurant.

“S-So,” she rushed herself to say. “Is there anyone else having gay thoughts?”

“You’re really interested in that, huh?” Marina looked around and pointed to a table with her head. There was a man sitting with a woman on his side and another woman across him. “There. The woman beside him is his wife. The one across him is his sister. But his sister is thinking about how she wanna fuck her brother’s wife.”

“Oh, wow, that’s,” Ann stopped, glancing at the table. “What is the wife thinking?”

“Well, she’s already cheating on her husband with another man and can’t stop thinking about him now.”

“That’s fucked up.”

Marina gave a bitter smile and turned her head to the side.

“That’s nothing. There’s way worse from other people around here,” she turned to Ann and held her hand. “But I won’t ruin your night. Let’s go to that movie you were eager to watch.”

***

Ann and Marina walked outside the theater after the movie. In the same moment that Ann thought about wanting to hold her girlfriend’s hand, she had her hand grabbed instead. Marina smiled again at her. She never got tired of seeing that smile.

“S-So, was the movie good?” Ann asked while trying to hide her embarrassment and joy.

“It was nice. Next time, let’s watch something alone at home, though.”

“Why?”

“Well, it was a mystery movie. And some people liked it so much that they came to watch a second, or third, or fourth time. And they can’t avoid thinking about the twists before they showed up.”

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t think about that.”

“Well, it’s fine. Spending time with you wasn’t bad either,” Marina squeezed Ann’s hands and looked into her eyes. “But that’s why next time I was thinking about watching something just us two at home. You like the idea too, right?”

“M-maybe,” Ann said trying to hide her jitters, even if she knew that was impossible. “As long as it’s something I didn’t watch yet, I guess.”

“Well, I don’t think I mind in your case. Watching you struggling with your thoughts for my sake is so fun.”

Marina smiled and Ann felt her heart jump. She felt like she was completely locked up in Marina’s grasp. She was happy and afraid about it at the same time.