Senses Fail - Bite to Break the Skin

My practice with the brothers was hardly better than Zodi's. I could focus on my hits and blocks, but I couldn't seem to control my strength, to hold myself back and we ended up cutting the session short after it became apparent I couldn't help myself.

"I'm sorry, a lot's on my mind today."

"Well, if you ever need to blow off some steam, I promise I can help."

Parish smiled at me as if I hadn't just broken all the ribs on the left side of his chest minutes earlier. Ailech was sweating from all the use he had gotten that evening, his hand shaking slightly as he pushed his wet hair back. Even Ember looked exhausted, and she had hardly done anything.

"And when he isn't satisfactory, remember, I'm the fun one."

Prey smirked over at me next, raising his eyebrows suggestively. I just shook my head at him. Something close to a smile ghosted my face, though even their antics couldn't get me to feel any lasting happiness. Ailech spoke a moment later and I wished I could steal the air from his lungs, but there were too many witnesses and Abby would have surely heard of it. He was good at taunting me when he knew I couldn't make him pay, like a sibling who only pokes his sister when their parents are around.

"Sorry to burst your odd little sexually deviant bubbles, but I think she's got her eyes on a different target. A skinny little twink of a guy with a bad attitude and a multitude of severe personality disorders?"

I glared while both the brothers roared and Ailech gave me a feigned look of sheepishness.

"I'm sorry, was that supposed to be a secret? Just let me know when he's staying the night. I'd hate to walk in on something mentally damaging. Some things just can't be unseen."

He gave a theatrical shiver as my glare darkened, Ember blushing like a rose next to him. Parish and Prey continued to laugh.

"Yeah, we have some bets riding on how long 'till the Angels hook up, so let us know when the dirty deed's done. I've got grand plans for Prey here when he loses."

Parish sounded nonchalant, but I suddenly wished our training wasn't done. I wanted nothing more than to bash his teeth in. They couldn't make bets on me. I wasn't some racehorse. Besides, I hated James, something everyone seemed to forget quite consistently.

"Are you done? I need a cold shower."

My words came out short and sharp. Ailech merely nodded to the door, clearly not planning on walking me to my room, probably because he knew I'd make him pay for his words as soon as we were out of sight of my tutors. I gave him one last dark look, letting him know to not bother trying to train with me later if he knew what was good for him, before stalking out of the room, ignoring the brothers' snickers behind me. Sometimes I wished they feared me more, but Abby had seemed to only pick insufferably undaunted tutors. I absently wondered how long that had taken him as I walked toward my wing.

I was almost to my door when I heard my neighbor open his. I looked without meaning to, without wanting to. I didn't want to see him, it ached, but there he stood with a duffel bag hanging from one hand, looking like a statue as he trapped my eyes in his. I hated how familiar his stance looked, how familiar the entire scene looked. I had seen him like this before, many times, when he would go out to the city after a vision, planning to stop some event from taking place. When he had stood in the woods, leaning against a tree, watching me as I tried to figure out what was going on in his mind, why he seemed different. The memory sent a sharp stab through me, but I ignored it.

That had been when he figured out what I was, but he hadn't told me. He had never planned to tell me. And that was why I hated him. Even though the man before me didn't look like the same James I had known, I knew it was still him, still the man who had deceived me and abandoned me. At least I thought it was the same man. I told myself it was.

"Going out?"

He looked shocked when I spoke to him, but shocked for his new, dead look was merely a minuscule widening of his empty eyes. I hated how shallow the emotion was on his face, like a half-asleep actor pretending to feel what the script told him to.

"Just training."

His voice was as dead as his eyes and it made something in me tighten, something strain toward my pair. Maybe that was why my next words came out without permission, like my body had forgotten how I felt. I cursed in my head as soon as the words left my lips.

"Need a sparring partner?"

He looked shocked again, this time a little more so than the first, and his stretched pause showed just how surprised he must have been at my offer. It seemed like he couldn't decide how to answer, and I almost enjoyed the look of confusion on his face. It wasn't like the old him, but it didn't look completely dead either. As the silence stretched on, my offer unanswered, I spoke again.

"I just had combat with my tutors, but they weren't quite up for me today. I could use some real practice if that's what you were headed to do anyway, that's all."

I didn't like how I felt like I had to explain myself, explain that I'd only asked because it would be mutually beneficial, and nothing else. For some reason, his silence annoyed me now, even though a moment earlier I had been pleased that he seemed so puzzled. My emotions didn't make sense when it came to him, especially the butterflies I had in my stomach, like a silly school girl who wanted to hold her crush's hand...and then crush it.

He finally shrugged noncommittally, which only annoyed me further. He wasn't even going to give me an answer. I wasn't even worth that much to him.

"Fine, if you don't want to train with me I don't really care. Just tell Abby I offered, I promised him I would."

My voice was cold and I knew I sounded bitter, like a scorned woman, but I couldn't help it. I had never been good at hiding my emotions when I spoke to my pair, at keeping my voice even, not unless I was Shifted, then my voice seemed to play any role I demanded of it.

James' eyes dropped to the ground for a brief moment before he spoke, his voice quiet and dull and lifeless.

"I'm not feeling well. I prefer to train alone this time."

That was the closest to an apology I thought I'd ever hear from him, and it annoyed me how easily his words could make my anger extinguish. Like his small excuse was enough reason for me to no longer feel discarded. Like one little puff of breath was enough to put out the inferno I thought I had built up against him. I wished I could stay mad at him more consistently, but my anger burned when he wasn't around and only flickered when he was. It was maddening how little my emotions made sense when it came to him. How I was concerned for him, worried about him, but wished I wasn't.

"You aren't sleeping tonight?"

He shook his head once.

"Have you eaten today?"

He gave another vague half-shrug.

I hated his ambiguous answers, like he expected me to pull every word from him. I didn't want to waste the effort, to give him the satisfaction of knowing I cared so much, was troubled so much by his behavior, his health. I didn't want him to know I worried about him like I did. I already had one foot over my room's threshold when he spoke, his words sounding like a confession, though his tone was still empty.

"I tried to eat but couldn't keep it down."

I swallowed hard and was glad he was still looking at the floor when I turned back to him, knowing he hadn't seen whatever emotion had shown on my face before I could cover it. Neither of us moved in the hall for what seemed much too long, but I couldn't seem to make myself go in my room, and he seemed just as cemented in place. A moment later, I felt myself relax as a little boy skipped down the hallway toward me, his black hair flapping in the breeze from his bounding steps. I smiled automatically at him.

My brother was visiting.

I fully expected him to stop, ask me to play with him, and then pull me down the hall to the closest forest, which is why my mouth dropped when he grabbed James' hand instead like he was an old friend. Levi had come from behind my pair and James began to instinctively pull his hand away from whatever had gripped it until he looked down and saw the little boy beaming up at him, all jet-black hair and pale blue eyes housed in a small, round, beaming face. James looked shocked for the third time in as many minutes, but I matched him now.

"Hi James, I'm Levi. I heard you were here now. Let's play. I've been waiting to meet you. You're the one my sister thinks she hates. My brother doesn't like you either, but Abby does so I'm sure I will too."

I silently cursed Levi's choice of words, 'thinks she hates' made it sound like I wasn't sure, like my emotions were still being decided. Which they weren't. Or were. I wasn't sure anymore. Levi's eyes came to mine at my profanity and I smiled apologetically, knowing he had heard.

James looked even more utterly shocked now, his mouth agape, eyebrows raised, even a slight look of worry in his eyes. He looked very much alive now, but I kept my eyes on Levi regardless.

"Don't worry, this isn't a trap or anything. Jordan and Abby's thoughts on you just don't make sense to me, so I've been curious. You aren't what I expected at all."

James slowly pried the little boy's fingers from his hand and took two deliberate steps backwards down the hallway, as if cautiously backing away from a wild animal, or retreating from some unknown danger, still looking confused but seeming to have made up his mind. I spoke before he had the chance to.

"I'd rather not tonight, Lee. And J- Gabriel has plans already and isn't feeling well. And I'm tired and it's just not a great time, okay kiddo? I'll make it up to you tomorrow, I promise."

I wished my block was better more now than ever, but I still wasn't able to keep my little brother out of my mind and I knew trying to dissuade him was a lost cause when he could hear every lie I told. I hoped James' mind would be more convincing.

He doesn't want to talk to me because he guessed I can hear his thoughts, but I've been waiting so long to meet him. Please, sis, please?

No. I don't want to talk to him or be around him.

You're lying again.

Please stop, you don't understand. I do but I don't. It's confusing and you couldn't possibly begin to understand what I mean.

I know you don't hate him.

Yes, I do.

No, you don't.

I glared at Levi, trying to look stern, but I knew it wouldn't work on him. When he thought he was right, he was impossible to sway.

I'll tell you his thoughts if you play with us.

I couldn't believe I was being bribed by a child, but he made a tempting offer. I would love to know what was going on in James' mind, what was really going on. Was it as empty as his eyes?

Fine by me. But good luck convincing him.

Levi gave me a brilliant smile and when I looked back to James he was far past shocked, past wary, he looked outright traumatized, his eyes flicked between Levi and me as he guessed that we had been speaking to each other, unbeknownst to him. Seeing his horror at not being in control, at being at a disadvantage for once, was amusing to me, comical even. I liked having a skill he didn't, being able to do something he couldn't.

Your head makes no sense when it comes to him.

I know.

Levi grabbed James' hand again and began to drag him toward my room. I was vaguely horrified and actually considered blocking their path with my body, but that seemed childish. I was only inviting him in to talk, and Levi was there, so there was nothing to be nervous about. But Parish and Prey and Ailech's taunts were still close in my mind, making it difficult to not feel strange allowing my pair into my bedroom.

You're gross. Stop thinking about that stuff.

I blushed as I swore in my head again, before apologizing to Levi for the second time, promising I wouldn't use that word when he was around. James' dull voice cut into our mental conversation, though it didn't sound as lifeless as usual, apprehension laced beneath his words.

"I'm really not feeling well, I-"

"You already threw up all your food today and you didn't really want to train anyway, you just didn't want to fall asleep and have a nightmare about the bad man and wake up crying. You'd rather sleep in a gym or empty library or something, especially if you can bolt the door. You're only pretending to feel so sick because you don't want me in your head. And you can't block me so you can stop trying. You're wasting your energy, and you don't have much of it to spare. Besides, almost no one can block me. It takes a lot of practice and you've been slacking in that area a lot lately, with your discipline I mean. I can tell."

Levi's words were matter-of-fact and I smiled at how mature he was acting. Sometimes I couldn't decide what age he should be.

"Who's A-"

James spun on the little boy, crouching down to his level and seizing his shoulders, his fingers pressing deeply into Levi's jacket. His voice was barely more than a growl.

"Don't say that name."

James' was staring at Levi intensely, and after a couple of seconds of silence, I could tell he was speaking with him in his mind. I wished I knew what he was saying, but I was afraid to use my Gift on him. The threat of feeling James' mind was still too much for me. It was taking great amounts of my control to only focus on Levi's mind, only listen when he was speaking to me, and to nothing else, to no one else, keeping what weak blocks I had up against everyone and everything else.

After a few more seconds Levi nodded, agreeing to whatever terms James had silently offered and I scowled. Now he'd never tell me. Levi tried very hard to keep his promises to people, to keep their secrets. Especially the ones he shouldn't know.

"I won't tell if you'll come in and play with us, come and talk with me."

I smirked at how he was bribing James just like he had bribed me, smart kid. He smiled at my compliment and I returned the expression lightly, stepping out of his path as he led James into my room.